Year 3 -11 April 2026 –- Vilha Faru- Dhoihivadhoo- South Miladhunmadulu Atoll -Maldives

We woke at a reasonable time and some had dips in the water. It was another lovely day and there was a little wind. Our plan was to go to Dhoihivadhoo and Island about 18 nm North and which had a resort being built but which was never finished as the developer went bust.

We had talked about a cooked breakfast but we had not got any bacon out the freezer. I therefore suggested we had one tomorrow.

Dholhiyadhoo is a private island in the Shaviyani Atoll of the Maldives, formerly home to the luxury Zitahli Dholhiyadhoo Resort & Spa. Following loan defaults and legal disputes with lenders, the island and its abandoned resort buildings have been repeatedly put up for sale by the State Bank of India since 2019, with a recent reserve price of $15 million.

We upped the anchor and headed away from the reef and into the deeper water of the adjacent island. The course we needed to take meant that the wind of course was right on the nose and so we could not sail. I looked at the angle we could sail at and it was almost 40 + degrees and if we had sailed then it would take us all day. I sensed this was not really what people wanted as to motor was just over 3 hours which we did at a slowish speed. J and Stig put out two fishing lines with great enthusiasm and there was a lot of talk about fresh tuna etc.

There was little traffic on our route and we had to go between various reefs and little islands. J had been doing the daily checks and there was some water to pump out the bilge. Bearing in mind we did this a few days ago it indicated a leak of some sort. We therefore took the companion steps up and I could see it was coming from my bathroom area. I therefore went to check and there was a regular drip coming from the washing machine pipe which was connected to a tap I could turn off. I put some PTFE tape on it and it still leaked as there was a fault with the fitting. I will leave the tap turned off and that should stop the leak. Annoying but could be the extra pressure of the water cylinders.

We motored on taking short shifts and we fixed a waypoint at the bottom of the lagoon. The island was a crescent moon shape with a lagoon in the centre. The entrance to the lagoon according to what I had read was about 10m and so we motored up and I slowed down with some crew on the bow. The depth went down to 8.5 m and once we were in rose to 30m. I had set a waypoint for a suggested anchor place and we motored slowly toward it and I could clearly see the ring of light blue water showing the shallow water.

We continued forward and I could make out patches in the water where the coral was. We came to about  8m and I reversed and we anchored in sand in about 17m and I could see with the wind direction forecast that we should be well away from the reef. We dropped the hook and waited for it to settle and then did our slow tick over and a 1,000 rev test and all was fine . The anchor windlass was working well.

Once anchored it was time for a cooling dip and the water was lovely and blue. J & Miranda went off to the reef and saw quite a bit of fish life.

We had coleslaw for lunch with a tomato salad and tinned Mackrell fillets as we had caught no fish, despite using the lures we had bought and which had been recommended.

We then rested and then we got the dinghy down with a view to going off to different parts of the reef to snorkel. Despite the fact that the engine had been serviced it would not start no matter what we did. It seemed to be getting fuel but was not sparking. As the reef was not far we rowed across and anchored and had a good snorkel on the reef. We saw a little bit of healthy coral and quite a lot of a variety of fish.

We rowed back and tidied up and I made a Stormbird cocktail which was followed by a beer. Due to the difficulty of buying alcohol we are having to ration.

We had got out some fish from the freezer and J & I cooked this with pak choy and spinach which tasted good.

We thought we would try the engine in the morning in case it had been flooded.

The island we were anchored off was a little sad. You could see the villas which had been built on concrete stilts in the water some with parts of rooves on and others like skeletons really. There were radio towers and the infrastructure was here. I think it came quite close to opening but never did. There were palm trees all around and a wide expanse of sand. If it has been finished it would have been a very attractive location. Apparently there is still a caretaker here and the island is still for sale.

We plan to chill out here tomorrow and go and explore the island if we can.             

The picture of today is a picture of some of the abandoned resort.

 Need/Opportunity Year Three

I will be going shortly from India to the Maldives and then on to Mauritius, Reunion, Cape Town, St Helena, Azores and back to the UK. 

I am looking for one crew from Mauritius/ Reunion Island to Cape Town (mid-June to end of July). If of any interest do email me.

The blog will continue as we continue the journey. If you have any comments or suggestions about the blog then do email me on hine.nick9@gmail.com