Kuramathi, Maldives

[Spotty Dog]

I'm thinking about heading here (it's just above North Ari Atoll) for a week at the end of May.

Can anyone recommend a dive centre on the island and what will the diving be like there at that time of year.

Thanks

Anne

[daz]

Anne if Kuramathi is anything like the other Islands in the Maldives, you will have a choice of one dive centre!

I am sure you will have a great time, have dived South Ari Atoll and it was a blast.

Daz

[Spotty Dog]

This island appears to have 3 dives centres on it (one for each resort).  I've emailed the one I have been recommended and now waiting for a reply and counting down the days until I'm there.

[kickmydog]

I have just arrived back from a holiday on the island of Kuramathi in the Maldives and whilst there I took the AOWD course with Rasdhoo Atoll Divers and had to pay $250 plus$105 for certification, at the time the price seemed rather expensive and since returning home I have found other dive schools only charge $140 plus $30 certification, and to top it off I purchased a 10 dive pack for $290 including tanks and weights only to get billed later for $4 per dive for the air to put in the tanks (like I dive with no air) and $12 per dive for the boat to take me to the dive site which on most dives was only a couple of minutes from the jetty. They have 3 dive centres there but they are all the same run by the same company. I feel very ripped of and would not recommend diving with these people the whole island seems to be a scam and you are the captive audience to be deprived of your money, as its all one company running the whole island so if you want anything it has to come from them.

[Spotty Dog]

Sorry but I have to disagree with you about feeling ripped off at Kuramathi.

I had a wonderful time and was quite happy with the price I paid. I assume you used 12l tanks as these are $4 extra (I didn't care since they had Nitrox and didn't charge extra for it and this is often more than $4 a tank).

I think boat dives are extra everywhere in the Maldives. We generally did at least 2 boat dives on the days we dived so each boat dive worked out at most $8.50 extra.

The resort we are going to next charges $316 for AOW plus boat costs and they require at least 4 people to run AOW. I would think it would be a special offer in the Maldives to get it for $170 (it will cost more than that in Egypt which has about the cheapest diving prices that I've found).

Sorry to hear that you were disappointed, If I could I would go back tomorrow.

Anne

(I was spottydog but when the board change format my login stopped working and I had to re-register so I asddded a 0)