Fuvamulah, Maldive

[fruehaufsteher2]

Diving with tiger sharks is actually only possible reliably and predictably at two spots in the world. One of them is Fuvamulah in the Maldives, and compared to the second spot, Grand Bahama, this is a cheaper option and particularly interesting for divers from Europe, Sri Lanka/India and China/Japan/Taiwan.
This is our second time here and I thought some information might be of interest to other big fish lovers. 
How do you get there? 
All roads lead via the Maldives' main airport in Malé. From there, you take a domestic flight, a turboprop plane, to Fuvamulah. The flight there is always organized by the hotel or the diving school; as a non-local, it is practically impossible to organize tickets yourself. The flight takes a good hour, so it is manageable. 

If you want to organize the trip yourself, the best way is via one of the now 11 diving schools. Whereas until a few years ago you had to plan well to get to the Tiger Zoo, there is now competition for divers and you have a good choice.
The oldest and best-known diving schools are Fuvamulah Dive School, Pelagic Divers and Sharkexpedition. You have to give Pelagic Divers credit for being ecologically committed and actually bringing large numbers of water filters to the island to reduce plastic bottles.

The guys are also pretty cool and still focused on safety - I would personally choose the Pelagic on my next trip. 

In terms of hotels, there are all levels from “pretty ok” to “pretty run down”. But a few new hotels have been built in the last two years at least. Still the most interesting are the “Ataraxis Grand” and the “Maa Thundi”. Here's a tip: the rooms on the 3rd floor are directly below the kitchen and bar. Because modern building standards are not so well known here, these rooms are quite noisy, sometimes until 1 am. 

There are actually only 2 attractions for underwater photographers: The tiger sharks directly in the harbor entrance and, unfortunately quite deep, the Thresher Sharks. In contrast to other atolls, there is little else to see. The house reef is reasonably good, but this year has also seen quite a bit of coral bleaching. 

Diving with the tigers is trivial: the boat leaves the harbor for about 50m, then it goes with a negative entry to a depth of about 10-15m. The diving spectators are placed with quite a lot of weight on the underwater edge to the harbor entrance and hold on to a rock formation. As soon as everyone is in place, the guide gives a signal to the boat and a few fish heads are dropped and partly hidden under rocks. The sharks know the procedure very well and are already waiting at a safe distance. 
It's nice that they came quite close, at least with us. This time we had a somewhat pushy tiger with us, who wanted to see if we might be tasty too. But that's what the guides do, and depending on their strategy, they either keep the animals away with poles or with their hands.
I recommend at least 3 tiger dives. Only after the third time are you relaxed enough to enjoy yourself. Four is better. 
The Thresher spot is a few hundred meters to the left of the harbour. Look out for the Threshers at a depth of around 35m, if you see one, you have to go much deeper. We didn't see any. 

The typical divers only commute between the hotel and the diving boat. The island is actually beautifully green and has much more to offer with its two freshwater lakes (be sure to hire a pedalo) and the many restaurants. We hired a scooter both times from the start, which was a very good decision. Beware, left-hand traffic and typical speed is 30-40km/h. Only one islander rides with a helmet. The others without. In terms of restaurants, the “Cool Banana” has the best food, but the “place to be” currently seems to be the “Briques”. In the harbor, “Oivaali” is the first choice. 

The house reef (especially on the west side) is 5-10m deep. If there is no swell, it is also possible from the beach. We had monsoon and waves - no chance. 

Negative: Plastic waste is a big problem. The islanders are blessed with unshakeable composure, unfortunately also with regard to illegally dumped waste. This is particularly terrible at the two freshwater lakes. The garbage dump north of the airport occasionally stinks terribly, I would avoid hotels in the vicinity. 

Overall: After 5 days it can get boring, but the beautiful sharks are absolutely worth the trip. If you are not afraid of the rainy season, a split with the Baa Atoll (Hanifaru Bay with manta rays) is recommended. 

I‘ll include the photos wenn I‘m back home.

 

[Davide DB]

Are you in a village with a diving center? Do you recommend it?

Several of my friends told me about the same problem with waste and especially plastic. And unfortunately where it seems to be not there is because it is discreetly burned

[TimG]

I’ve just been in Sri Lanka and now understand why the EU has mandated that plastic bottle tops must be attached so they cannot be separated from the bottle. The amount of bottle tops I collected on a beach was depressing. Plastic everywhere. 

[fruehaufsteher2]

21 hours ago, Davide DB said:

Are you in a village with a diving center? Do you recommend it?

Several of my friends told me about the same problem with waste and especially plastic. And unfortunately where it seems to be not there is because it is discreetly burned

As soon as I have better connection I‘ll open a thread with some recommendations on local islands of the Maledives where other can contribute too. 
I can absolutely recommend coming here, but you have to be aware of the limitations. 

Somehow the pics don’t show… strange…

[Davide DB]

25 minutes ago, fruehaufsteher2 said:

Somehow the pics don’t show… strange…

 

Jpeg?

[Crasoner]

A few days ago it took me ages to get open any post from the android app. As slow as the focus of the Canon G1🤣. My smartphone was sharp so it was not the problem. 

[bghazzal]

On 8/25/2024 at 5:03 PM, fruehaufsteher2 said:

Currently on Fuvamulah, far away from the Waterpixels-server. 
 

Loading the website is really slow, other than other pages. Is it just me who is experiencing this problem or is it generally slow? 
AFAIK sometimes the ads cause the lag? 
 

 

speaking of Fuvahmulah

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/aug/27/could-these-maldives-tiger-sharks-help-solve-the-holy-grail-of-shark-research

 

 

[Davide DB]

Martin, did you probe the shark's belly for pregnancy? 🙂

 

[fruehaufsteher2]

The sharks came yesterday really, really close- even the guides were a little nervous. I didn’t have an ultrasound with me so I couldn’t look for pregnancies 🫣

But the number of dive centers increased and there are only a few I can recommend (pelagic divers, dive point, dive school) which are responsible, respectful to the sharks and restrict the number of divers per slot to 6 or so … others take up to 11 divers to the small area. 
 

we were lucky and had sort of private diving! 

[fruehaufsteher2]

On 8/25/2024 at 6:51 PM, Davide DB said:

Are you in a village with a diving center? Do you recommend it?

The whole island is one village. Close to the harbor there is a dump where they burn their garbage… avoid this area. recommended hotels are Ataraxis and Mathundi. 

[stillviking]

Wow I would just poo myself being there without a cage.

[Davide DB]

Which depth and lens used for these photos?

 

Thanks

[fruehaufsteher2]

3 hours ago, Davide DB said:

Which depth and lens used for these photos?

 

Thanks

Hi Davide,

 

available light, around 10m (same as Grand Bahama) WACP-C and 28-60. 

 

You are located at the edge of the outlet of the harbor and just 50cm above the ground. So any action by the many fish leads to more backscatter. Not ideally for photography. I tried flash but the results were worse. 

[Muellema]

[Muellema]

Hi,

 

sorry but text on former postwas removed after i pushed the "submit reply" button, so here again:

 

We dived and stayed Fuva with divepoint. Used Internet only in the hotel. Access was very good. On 5 days of diving we had 2 private session (one day 1/2 hour, one day 1 hour due to cancellation of following group) Tiger dives were amazing, outer reef dives not as expected. Br Markus

[fruehaufsteher2]

Diving with tiger sharks is actually only possible reliably and predictably at two spots in the world. One of them is Fuvamulah in the Maldives, and compared to the second spot, Grand Bahama, this is a cheaper option and particularly interesting for divers from Europe, Sri Lanka/India and China/Japan/Taiwan.
This is our second time here and I thought some information might be of interest to other big fish lovers. 
How do you get there? 
All roads lead via the Maldives' main airport in Malé. From there, you take a domestic flight, a turboprop plane, to Fuvamulah. The flight there is always organized by the hotel or the diving school; as a non-local, it is practically impossible to organize tickets yourself. The flight takes a good hour, so it is manageable. 

If you want to organize the trip yourself, the best way is via one of the now 11 diving schools. Whereas until a few years ago you had to plan well to get to the Tiger Zoo, there is now competition for divers and you have a good choice.
The oldest and best-known diving schools are Fuvamulah Dive School, Pelagic Divers and Sharkexpedition. You have to give Pelagic Divers credit for being ecologically committed and actually bringing large numbers of water filters to the island to reduce plastic bottles.

The guys are also pretty cool and still focused on safety - I would personally choose the Pelagic on my next trip. 

In terms of hotels, there are all levels from “pretty ok” to “pretty run down”. But a few new hotels have been built in the last two years at least. Still the most interesting are the “Ataraxis Grand” and the “Maa Thundi”. Here's a tip: the rooms on the 3rd floor are directly below the kitchen and bar. Because modern building standards are not so well known here, these rooms are quite noisy, sometimes until 1 am. 

 

There are actually only 2 attractions for underwater photographers: The tiger sharks directly in the harbor entrance and, unfortunately quite deep, the Thresher Sharks. In contrast to other atolls, there is little else to see. The house reef is reasonably good, but this year has also seen quite a bit of coral bleaching. 

 

Diving with the tigers is trivial: the boat leaves the harbor for about 50m, then it goes with a negative entry to a depth of about 10-15m. The diving spectators are placed with quite a lot of weight on the underwater edge to the harbor entrance and hold on to a rock formation. As soon as everyone is in place, the guide gives a signal to the boat and a few fish heads are dropped and partly hidden under rocks. The sharks know the procedure very well and are already waiting at a safe distance. 
It's nice that they came quite close, at least with us. This time we had a somewhat pushy tiger with us, who wanted to see if we might be tasty too. But that's what the guides do, and depending on their strategy, they either keep the animals away with poles or with their hands.
I recommend at least 3 tiger dives. Only after the third time are you relaxed enough to enjoy yourself. Four is better. 
The Thresher spot is a few hundred meters to the left of the harbour. Look out for the Threshers at a depth of around 35m, if you see one, you have to go much deeper. We didn't see any. 

 

The typical divers only commute between the hotel and the diving boat. The island is actually beautifully green and has much more to offer with its two freshwater lakes (be sure to hire a pedalo) and the many restaurants. We hired a scooter both times from the start, which was a very good decision. Beware, left-hand traffic and typical speed is 30-40km/h. Only one islander rides with a helmet. The others without. In terms of restaurants, the “Cool Banana” has the best food, but the “place to be” currently seems to be the “Briques”. In the harbor, “Oivaali” is the first choice. 

The house reef (especially on the west side) is 5-10m deep. If there is no swell, it is also possible from the beach. We had monsoon and waves - no chance. 

 

Negative: Plastic waste is a big problem. The islanders are blessed with unshakeable composure, unfortunately also with regard to illegally dumped waste. This is particularly terrible at the two freshwater lakes. The garbage dump north of the airport occasionally stinks terribly, I would avoid hotels in the vicinity. 

Overall: After 5 days it can get boring, but the beautiful sharks are absolutely worth the trip. If you are not afraid of the rainy season, a split with the Baa Atoll (Hanifaru Bay with manta rays) is recommended. 

 

I‘ll include the photos wenn I‘m back home. 

[Davide DB]

Thanks for your report. Looking forward to see your photos.

 

[stillviking]

Cool report! Snorkeling with the tigers not possible, right?

[Muellema]

Hi, stillviking

 

wouldn't recommend snorkeling with Tigers. We dived 5 days there and stayed always close to the bottom. After session we moved quick back to our boat. The Tigers in the bluewater on our way back to the boat didn`t look very friendly and our guides were also a little bit stressed till we reached the boat.

 

Br Markus

[fruehaufsteher2]

After Oceanramsay had visited Dharavandoo and Fuvamulah, there had been a huge trend in freediving. Some of the diving schools still offer freediving with tigers. 
But with the given situation in Fuvamulah there’s not much of a sense. „Fish from above“ is only in few exceptions a good way to take pictures. 

[Muellema]

Hi,

 

I dive for more than 30 years worlwide. Fuva I did this year. I would never ever do freediving there with the tigers even with diveschools. The dive operators feed the sharks with fish/tuna rubbish. So from my of view it`s just to dangerous. Just my opinion......Anyway, everybody has it`s own view....

 

Br Markus

[fruehaufsteher2]

Here some pictures from the dives, second pic shows the situation - my wife is the one with the white fins and approaching the position from where you can watch the sharks

[fruehaufsteher2]

And here the pics showing the island:

 

Edited September 2 by fruehaufsteher2

[fruehaufsteher2]

[TimG]

7 minutes ago, fruehaufsteher2 said:

 

 

And how many megapixels would that sensor be?