A dive trip to the Maldives is on the bucket list of almost every certified scuba diver. Rightly so – the diving here is mind-blowing for beginner and seasoned divers alike! But even if you already have a few certification cards under your belt, you may want to consider adding a PADI specialty to your fun dive package. Here’s why:

• • • With strong currents, great viz and a variety of marine life and ecosystems, the diving conditions here are perfect for expanding your scuba knowledge, abilities and experience.
    • Here at Fulidhoo Dive, you can use dives from your dive and stay package towards completing a PADI specialty. We simply charge for the PADI learning materials, PADI certification fee and a nominal additional fee for training. So what are you waiting for? Make every dive count!
    • And if you don’t want to study on holiday, you can pay an advance and we can set you up the PADI e-learning so you can complete the theory element of your chosen specialty before you arrive.
    • Also – don’t forget – if you have already completed an adventure training dive as part of your PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course, it COUNTS towards the corresponding specialty. So if, for example, you did a PADI Adventure Drift Dive as part of your AOW course, you would only need to do ONE more training dive to get the specialty rating. However, you must have proof of this logged dive signed or verified by your dive instructor.
    • Remember – all these PADI specialties count towards your PADI Master Scuba Diver rating – the highest non-professional scuba rating there is!

1) PADI Enriched Air Diver Specialty (Nitrox)

The Maldives is the PERFECT location to dive with Enriched Air, more commonly known as Nitrox. We think diving with nitrox is so great that we actually offer it on a complimentary basis to certified Enriched Air divers. Our dive profiles lend themselves perfectly to diving with 32% Nitrox – leading to more time with the big stuff and better profiles on multiple dives. We’re so passionate about getting you Nitrox certified that we wrote a whole separate blog about it – you can find it here! And remember, the PADI Enriched Air Diver specialty is a non-diving course, so we can set you up with e-learning before you arrive, complete the face to face element on the evening of your arrival and then you can dive with Nitrox from your first dive – it’s a no-brainer!

2) PADI Drift Diver

The Maldives isn’t the easiest dive destination – we can experience strong currents in our famous channel and wall dives, so you’re going to want to make sure you are ready for them. The PADI Drift Diver specialty course will make sure that you are. There are only 2 obligatory open water dives in this specialty, so you can complete it in one morning. You’ll learn about very important things such as – how to dive in currents, what to do if you get caught in a current and how to tailor a dive with a strong current in mind.

3) PADI Peak Performance Buoyancy

Having good buoyancy really is the key to good diving. Mastering and improving your buoyancy skills will allow you to:

• Dive in an eco-friendly manner, avoiding any contact with the ecosystem
• Avoid crashing into your buddy or dive group
• Avoid running through your air trying to control your position in the water
• Allow you to be present in the dive and take in your surroundings instead of focusing on your trim
• Attend a buoyancy clinic

And so much more! If you’re a bit rusty, an inexperienced diver – or simply want to improve – this is the specialty for you!

4) PADI AWARE Shark Conservation

The Maldives is the perfect destination to learn more about sharks – because we see sharks on the majority of our dives! These gentle, misunderstood creatures are not only fascinating, but vulnerable. This specialty teaches you about why exactly that is, and what you can do to advocate for shark populations! After some great info on shark biology and the threats they face, the two open water dives will teach you to recognize and identify certain key shark behaviours. In addition, we’ll teach you how to behave during a dive to have the best shark encounter possible! This specialty is a must for those who love sharks and want to know more about them!

5) PADI DSMB Diver

Since almost every dive in the Maldives is a drift dive, knowing how to deploy a DSMB and knowing which DSMB is the best choice for this kind of diving is crucial. It might not be the sexiest sounding specialty out there but this is really important stuff. Deploying a DSMB only fairly recently made its way into the PADI Open Water course, so if you were certified a long time ago, chances are that maybe you have never had the opportunity to do so – so this specialty is worth thinking about. And for those who haven’t had much practice either, we highly recommend it.

6) PADI Naturalist Diver

When diving,  there’s no doubt we see incredible things. But do you really know what you’re looking at? Do you understand the ecosystems you’re exploring – how they survive, how the animals exist together in symbiotic harmony? If you have an interest in the natural world and want to know more, then this is the specialty for you.  Understanding the phenomena and the behaviour you witness underwater brings a whole new dimension to scuba diving.

7) PADI Deep Diver

In the Maldives, by law we can only dive to a maximum depth of 30 meters. This is according to the Maldivian Diving Regulations that govern recreational scuba diving in the country. We take this seriously and follow Maldivian law. Having said this, we do dive to 30m on most days and this is considered deep diving. So we do highly recommend that you know the implications. At the end of the day, it’s not the depth that you hit that is most important, it’s what you learn during the course that matters. You’ll learn the procedures of deep diving and experience a simulated emergency decompression stop.

BONUS: PADI Sidemount Diver

At Fulidhoo Dive, we are big fans of sidemount diving, and if you are too, then we’re friends already! If you’re curious about diving with two tanks rather than one, get in touch and we’ll discuss the possibility of getting you sidemount certified! We’ve got some great sidemount gear available to rent and you’ll experience, rigging sidemount kit, confined water training as well as 3 open water dives on sidemount. Sidemount opens the door to entry level recreational technical diving too, and stands as one of the prerequisites for tec diving, so it’s worth considering if you want to go down that route one day.

Got a question about our PADI specialties? Get in touch via hello@fulidhoodive.com or via our socials.