Trip Report - Deep South Maldives March 1st To March 12th 2016

[chillyinCanada]

[Qdidn't TE="tarponchik, post: 7662558, member: 129241"]"Zinah" is the correct spelling. He's a nice guy overall, very knowledgeable and shows lots of stuff but also a control freak. For example, on one of the manta dives our group was the last to dive. When we got to the cleaning station, I was going to take a spot between 2 divers at about 65 ft but suddenly Zinah grabbed me by the shoulder and dragged me down to watch mantas from about 82 ft. I absolutely did not like that since such an arrangement ensured that I'd be the last one in and the 1st one out.[/QUOTE]

I didn't find Zinah that way myself but wasn't in his group. How about Lars?

 

[tarponchik]

Did not meet Lars. We had Zinah, Alto and Ibi (Ibrahim).

 

[chillyinCanada]

Sorry tarponchik. When were you aboard her?

 

[scubafanatic]

Thanks for your report. I just got back from there. My understanding is, corals are better in the north and to watch big stuff you go south.

What I did not like was their obsession with safety. Maldivian scuba regulations are certainly an overkill in safety. Like, if I did not dive for 3 months I have to go through an orientation dive and demonstrate that I can clean my mask and find my reg if it fells out of my mouth. They impose their own max depth of 30 m (98.5 ft) and those guys who rented us tanks for shore diving threatened to check our comps for max depth we reached (though never bothered to). You fill endless questionnaire with 50 health related points and if you answer "yes" to any question they ask for doctor's statement that you can dive. And constant reminding from the DMs to stay near your buddy kills all the fun underwater.

Those 'regulations' and rampant big-brotherism are enough to completely cross the Maldives off my bucket list! The shore tank rental crew is especially 'special' threatening to tattle-tale on you....WOW, what d*cks! ...what a country! I'm taking the long way to work tomorrow with my SUV to add that much more CO2 to the atmosphere to accelerate sea level rise!

 

[tarponchik]

Sorry tarponchik. When were you aboard her?

I was on their new boat, Carpe Novo.

 

[chillyinCanada]

OK! ! I misunderstood. How did you like her. She's supposed to be better than Carpe Vita, which wouldn't be easy. You were with the crew we had on Carpe Vita.

 

[tarponchik]

Those 'regulations' and rampant big-brotherism are enough to completely cross the Maldives off my bucket list! The shore tank rental crew is especially 'special' threatening to tattle-tale on you....WOW, what d*cks! ...what a country! I'm taking the long way to work tomorrow with my SUV to add that much more CO2 to the atmosphere to accelerate sea level rise!

Diving was good after all, I just had to be more prepared morally for this kind of stuff. This is completely different from group diving in say, Roatan or Costa Rica where DMs do not give a damn as long as you do not totally stray away or damage the reef. In Maldives, you are treated like an elementary school kid on a trip to Disneyland. In another episode, we were hooking on to the reef edge to watch the sharks and Napoleons. I was going to take a spot next to my buddy-wife who hooked up there 1st but another diver got there before I could. This is OK, we are all excited, so I hook up next, someone hooks up next to me etc. So I am aiming my camera at 3 reef sharks slowly drifting in front of me but suddenly I got a pat on my shoulder. I turn my head and see the DM, Alto in this case, showing me the "stay with your buddy" sign. What kind of stupid sh$t is this?! I just shrugged him off.

But Carpe Diem DMs at least showed us plenty of stuff. The morons from Dive Ocean at Biyadhoo only watched us so we won't go too deep. DM Andrea showed us only what we already saw, like, here is a reef shark in front of us! OK, we already noticed, thank you very much. The other guy, Maaz or Meez (I forgot) simply swam one way, then back w/o ever stopping or even slowing down.

 

[chillyinCanada]

Wow, Tarpon, so not like my experiences with them at all (Carpe Vita). Maybe there's been some kind of tune-up.

 

[tarponchik]

Quite possibly. You and me can be very different. I've seen plenty of divers who are somehow glued together underwater, so this may be OK with you and maybe you did not even notice. But we are more like 2 solo divers who dive together, so this intrusive supervision was quite irritating to us. Some supervision could be helpful, of course, cause we did not have plenty of experience with strong currents except for a dozen easy drift dives in Cozumel and the Bahamas, but aside from that, please leave us alone.

I do not think this is really the Carpe's DMs fault, they are great guys. Alto is an excellent DM overall and very competent (On one dive my BCD inflator valve blue after the jump so I could not descend. Alto figured out faster than I what was going on and he quickly disconnected the hose. I went into the dive inflating the BCD with my mouth). This is the consequence of the whole safety hysteria coming from their government. The rules I gave link to above put too much stress on the DMs.

Interestingly, on one dive we saw a whole group of divers well below us and certainly below the 30 m limit. The explanation we were given later was "Oh, these were probably Italians. They do not obey the rules". On another dive, we watched a group of Chinese divers, who moved around us chaotically, like beans in a coffee grinder. Buddy rules? What buddy rules?

 

[chillyinCanada]

Well, ah, no. I'm not one of those types. and yes, I did get moved around a time or two on each of the itineraries but it was either for my overall advantage or that of the group. I was also left quite on my own a number of times. That was lovely for the most part. The currents being so wicked, I'm thinking they're probably best to do some cat herding. I'm thinking Alto is the guy that led me on the last itinerary which was the north exploration trip.