The boat leaves on these dates, and you book a cabin on one

They are set. The boat leaves on the dates on this site and you book a cabin on one of them, which is the whole difference between a safari boat and a hotel.

That is also why a cabin cancelled inside twenty eight days is charged in full. We cannot move a boat to suit one booking and we cannot resell a cabin in a fortnight.

The boat sails and the itinerary changes. The captain moves us to the lee side of whatever is closest and we dive there instead.

The itinerary on this site is a plan and not a promise. In the rains expect it to change at least twice in a week. Nothing is refunded for a changed itinerary, and a trip has never been cancelled for weather in eleven years.

Three or four a day on the central itinerary, including one night dive and usually two early morning channel dives. Four a day on the southern trip when the tides allow.

No dive on the last morning, because you fly. Eighteen hours between the last dive and a flight is a rule here and not a suggestion, and it is why the last day is a beach day.

The central atolls trip is fine from about twenty logged dives, with a refresher in the lagoon if your last dive was more than a year ago.

The southern trip needs fifty logged dives and recent current experience, and we do check the logbook. We have turned somebody back at the jetty for saying fifty and meaning twelve, and we would do it again.

There is a satellite link. It carries messages and email, slowly, and it will not carry a video call.

Inside the atolls there is usually mobile signal on deck and none at all in the cabins. On the southern crossings there is nothing for hours at a time. Tell whoever is at home that this is normal before you leave.

Twenty eight metres, steel hull, eight cabins, sixteen guests and nine crew. A dining saloon on the main deck, a sun deck with shade, and a shower on the back deck for rinsing off.

It is a working boat rather than a floating hotel. The cabins are air conditioned and have their own shower rooms, and none of them is large. What the money buys is the diving and the dhoni.