The Maldives – Overview
Wildlife in the Maldives
A spectacular marine environment
There is plenty of wildlife in the Maldives – especially below the surface of the sea.
Beautiful, colourful fish, small blacktip reef sharks, stingrays, hermit crabs and much more.
We also saw a considerably bigger shark – we think it was a leopard shark around 2 metres long – and we went on the most beautiful dolphin safari at sunset.
I also made the acquaintance of a jellyfish on one of our first days in the sea. I was out swimming with the girls when I suddenly felt something burning my leg. I couldn’t see a thing despite the clear water, so I didn’t quite understand what it could be
.
We got out of the water and it burned and stung quite a bit, and I got a throbbing, cramping sensation in my leg. Nothing dramatic at all, just a strange feeling. When it was still there after half an hour or so, I popped into the dive centre to ask their advice, and they said straight away that it was just small jellyfish and that they were completely harmless. They had a big spray bottle labelled “Vinegar” standing ready, which they sprayed my leg with, and within an hour or so the pain was gone. So they were clearly used to it 
We had no further run-ins with jellyfish for the rest of the holiday, and we practically lived in the sea – so I think I was simply unlucky.
The girls spent a lot of time with the sweet little hermit crabs on the beach – such a lovely thing for them to do, and you really did want to take a bucket of the cute little creatures home with you. They are SO sweet.
We also saw lots of flying foxes (fruit bats) – they flew over to us from a nearby island at the same time every afternoon. Really big, and simply stunning with their wide wingspan.
Small geckos sat high up on the bathroom ceiling – the bathroom was open at the top of the wall all the way round, so they had free access. But they don’t do any harm, so we left them to it.
There were also plenty of lizards when we walked through the “jungle” – a pleasant bit of rustling between the trees.
The paths at The Standard
We hardly noticed the mosquitoes at all – I got a couple of bites on the second-to-last evening, and that was actually it. Normally our youngest gets quite literally eaten alive by mosquitoes, but she didn’t get a single bite, so whether we were just lucky I don’t know. We had brought plenty of mosquito spray with us, but didn’t use a drop.
There were also a few different flying insects, in no way a nuisance – and I’m really not keen on that sort of thing otherwise.
We didn’t see any spiders, snakes or anything like that – I don’t even know whether they exist in the Maldives
So to those who have written in feeling nervous about it, I can reassure you that we saw nothing on the whole trip that could be called dangerous or creepy.
For those following along on Instagram, the “scariest” experience of the trip was a crab that had dug itself into the sand and which we thought looked like a big spider. You can see the episode in my “travel” highlights on IG.
The Standard
Angsana Velavaru
All about the Maldives
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