Marine Life in the Maldives

Your guide meets you at Male International Airport and helps you aboard the public speedboat bound for Dhangethi in South Ari Atoll. For just under two hours you skim across the Indian Ocean, low islands drifting past on either side and the occasional pod of dolphins breaking the surface.

This afternoon you head out for an acclimatisation snorkel: your tour leader runs through a responsible-snorkelling briefing and acts as your spotter, pointing out marine life you might otherwise miss. After dinner, they introduce the work of the Maldives Whale Shark Research Program, sharing the monitoring and studies that set the scene for tomorrow's safari.

Please note: Morning and afternoon departure 09:30 and 14:30.

Bikinis are not permitted on local beaches but can be worn in private guesthouse areas such as gardens, balconies, or designated tourist beaches.

We strongly recommend you bring your own mask and snorkel on this tour, both for hygiene reasons and to ensure a proper fit.

This itinerary applies to departures from 01 November 2026 onwards. If you're travelling before this date, please contact us, as a different itinerary applies.

Male - Dhigurah. South Ari Atoll is one of the few places where whale sharks gather along the reefs behind Dhigurah, within SAMPA — the South Ari Marine Protected Area. There are no guarantees with wild animals, so you do it the old-fashioned way: out on the boat, scanning the blue. You might find two or three in half an hour, or none at all, and that uncertainty is half the thrill.

When one appears, you slip in and snorkel alongside it, following the whale shark code of conduct and SAMPA regulations. As the heat softens, your guide walks you through Dhangethi — past the mosque, school, medical centre and police station — teaches you to crack open a coconut, and stops at a café for hedika. Over coffee after dinner, talk turns to the pressures on the reef and what we can do to ease them.

This morning you head out by boat for another underwater encounter, dropping onto reefs alive with fish — keep watch for turtles and reef sharks gliding through the blue. Back on Dhangethi, there's time for water sports if you've energy to spare.

After lunch you snorkel the seagrass beds, an ecosystem often dismissed as unsightly and stripped away, yet one of the most valuable on the planet. Your guide shows you how the meadows, the coral reefs and the marine life that depends on them are all bound together — a quiet but vital part of the atoll you'd otherwise swim straight past.

Dhigurah - Male. After an early breakfast, you transfer by morning public speedboat back to Male, connecting with Male International Airport or your onward destination.