There must be something special in the waters of Lhaviyani Atoll at the moment. For the past few weeks manta sightings have been incredible, “we haven’t had a manta season like this for years!” Darren, Base Leader at Pro Divers, Kuredu.  Day after day especially ”Fushivaru” has been Pumping with mantas and other treats.

Imagine the surprise of the morning dive boats to Fushivaru, not only did they have a great time with 20-30 mantas and Sail Fish, but they also swam with mating dolphins for 20 min. As if their morning couldn’t get any better, when they got out of the water four blue whales swam past!

Blue Whales are endangered animals and where hunted almost to extinction by whalers until they were protected by the international community in 1966. There are actually 4 subspecies of blue whales in the oceans, 2 of which live in the Indian ocean, the B. m. indica and B. m. brevicauda (also known as the pygmy blue whale).

In all likely hood the whales that visited Kuredu were pygmy blue whales, but at 24 meters in length they were by no means small. The whales spent the day cruising past the atoll, guests from several boats got the chance to spend some time with these gentile giants as they came up for air. After swimming past Kuredu Caves the whales said good by and returned to the deep.

A few months back sperm whales also visited Kuredu, read more here! or check out the video of the sperm whales made by Prodivers here.