Our his/hers Day in Male, Maldives

Well today was something – our water depth went from hundreds of meters to 30 meters during our approach to our destination.

Although the sky’s were partly cloudy and there was a bit of haze in the air, our sail in was quite spectacular.

In the distance lies the airport and what looks to be new construction of some sort, as the Chinese are very active in the region.

A small group from Cruise Critic were scheduled to take a “walking excursion” as soon as we could get ashore and form up, however since this was a tender port it wasn’t as simple as it sounds. It appeared that HAL had sold a number of shore excursions and they had priority o the first tenders. Since Barbara and I are five star mariners, we thought we could assist the group with our “priority boarding”. After waiting in a somewhat less than friendly line, my patience failed, and I bailed.

Watching the tender loading operation from Deck 6, it was obvious that the plan had failed as well, as it appeared that staff was not going to be snookered.

I took a later tender and happened upon the group, but did not join up. I found a coffee shop relieved my bursting bladder, had a Cappuccino, took some pictures and headed back to the ship for lunch.

Ever wonder what it’s like to ride a tender in choppy waters? Hopefully this one minute video will help:

How about those stairs/ladders, great fun, huh?

Walking along the sidewalk, one was surrounded by motors of every class, even a few bicycles filling up the streets(moving) sidewalks and parking lots.

Tour boats and small ferries lined the small protected boat haven where our tenders landed. Buildings of every size and style lined the waterfront.

Including some very sleek looking Coast Guard small craft.

And, waiting for us all the time ….

…. our “safe harbor”.

About those flowers, I only found a Lilly pond ….

…. with a flower under pollination ….

…. and this one lone bush!

My ride is waiting – time to go home.

Welcome back Jack!

A couple of final looks, and that’s all folks! Notice how close to the water the waterfront is, less that a meter from flooding, I guess.

One final comment/observation – the water speed limit, is however fast your craft can move.

Tomorrow we sail onward, a short distance north to Utheemu, Maldives, then eastward to Colombo, Sri Lanka, Langkawi, Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and our final destination; Singapore on the 15th.