This small lslamic nation of fishing and trading people has a history, cuture and language all its own. The Maldives is made up of a string of 1190 tiny islands, most of them measuring less than a couple of kilometers and bobbing only a few metres above sea level. lf your idea of paradise is pristine tropical is land with swaying palm trees, white-sand beaches and turquoise lagoons, then the Maldives will not disappoint.
December to April (the dry season)
Swimming in a clear-blue lagoon, strolling on soft white sand and sitting under a coconut tree Scuba diving to see turtles, mantas and morays, whale sharks, nurse sharks, hammerheads and rays Exploring the underwater shipwreck Maldive Victory, alive with corals and home to trevally, snapper, squirrelfish and cod taking a flight over the atolls and watching the free-from patterns of sea, sandbank, reef and island
Read Mysticism in the Maldives, which documents Maldivian myths and stories
Listen to popular local bands Mezzo and Zero Degree
Eat garudia (soup made from dried and smoked fish, often eaten with rice, lime and chilli) for a main meal and finish off with an arecanut (an oval nut ahewed with betel leaf, cloves and lime), which is the equivalent of an after-dinner mint
Drink raa (a sweet and delicious toddy tapped from the crown of the trunk)
A-salam alekum(hello)
Pristine tropical islands; swaying palm trees; pure white-sand beaches; brilliant aquamarine water; abundant marine life; gloriously coloured coral; peerless diving
Ancient beliefs survive: the islanders fear jinnis-evil spirits that come from the sea, land and sky; the full name of the coutry is Dhivehi Raajjeyge jumhooriyyaa
Just a few metres below the surface, it’s a world of steep cliffs, big boulders and vast blue voids-a complete contrast to the uniform flatness of the island and the sea. The water is filled with huge whale sharks, graceful turtles, sluggish sea cucumbers and schools of psychedelic-coloured fish. Soft corals, sea fans, feather stars and sponges decorate the reefs, while staghorns and colourful polyp patches are colonising the old hard-coral blocks.