Tuesday morning Jon was able to schedule another dive. This time he asked to be taken to a local manta ray site. Now, if you thought the pictures of the stingrays were large, manta rays can reach up to a whopping 23 feet in width! People at the dive shop had said how cool of an experience it was for them to be diving and have manta rays swim above them, blocking out the sunlight for a minute.
Mantas are unfortunately, highly threatened due to net fishing, in which they get caught, as well as due to being hunted for what some cultures believe to be medicinal purposes. The Maldives is taking practices to protect them and are over 140 resident manta rays around the atoll. It's one of the thing the Maldives are best known for and why people come from all over to dive, in hopes to see a manta. They bring in more money from tourism then they do being sold for medicinal purposes so there's also a reason to save them for the local tourism industry.
Unfortunately, Jon wasn't able to see any mantas that day, but did get in a great dive and saw a bunch of fish, some reef sharks and turtles. It was the farthest he's ever dove so far and only his second recreational dive. I got in some snorkeling in the seagrass while Jon was diving. I don't have much interest in diving. While I love being in the ocean and participating in some activity, staying on top of the water is more my thing.
That night the staff held a management cocktail reception for all the guests on the beach. They left traditional Maldivian sarongs in our room for us to wear. We put them on, (Jon, a little begrudgingly), and head down to the beach just off of the pool area. There were lovely huts set up with canapes and drinks.
About halfway through cocktails, staff came out with drums and began singing and dancing traditional Maldivian songs. The dancers looked like they were having such a good time, it was so enjoyable to watch! Some guests started to join in as well, dancing along to the beat. They performed for about 20 minutes before it all came to an end.
While sitting on the beach, we noticed the fruit bats leaving the island and flying across to a nearby island for the night. We had noticed a fruit bat by the pool the other day because of how large it is. Everything you think you know about bats, they're small, they only come out at night, they can't see. Wrong. These bats have a wing span of 2 feet on average. They land in the fruit trees and them climb through them with the top of their wings like little winged monkeys.
After cocktails we head down to Chill Bar and thought we'd grab one of the lounges on the deck and grab a drink, a waiter walked us over and handed us menus and then attended to a table in the restaurant above. So we waited and watched the sunset.
And we waited some more.
Apparently, the waiter forgot about us. Which is fine, truthfully. We're in a beautiful place watching the sunset so I don't think anything could upset us at this point and additionally Jon and I have both waited tables before and know how crazy things can get at the drop of a hat. We got up off the lounge, went the few steps up to the bar and grabbed a seat and ordered a drink directly from the bar. No biggie. When the waiter realized what happened his face dropped and apologized profuously. We told him no big deal and took our drinks to one of the couch areas. When we went to pay our bill that night they refused to let us and covered it for us. Completely unnecessary but appreciated. I am mentioning this story not only because it was so incredibly nice of them and shows how incredible the service was, but because it even comes into play tomorrow as well.