Back in the late 70s and early 80s, when the Maldives first started to encourage hotels, the whole point - the sole point - of going was the marine life. I went in the mid-80s and stayed at was what one of the few upmarket hotels, the Taj, which was actually two hotels based on Biyadhoo Island and its neighbouring atoll. I had flown up from Adelaide via Singapore on Singapore Airlines. From Male Airport, you got there in a three-hour voyage in a dhoni. Speedboats, seaplanes and helicopters were unknown. The island was tiny with lovely little beaches. The house reef was astonishing, an incredible spectacle, and people also went out diving, which I don't do. However, even by the standards of those days, the hotel was terrible with very basic rooms. Food mainly consisted of tinned pasta and vegetables with locally caught fish. They were proud of growing their own tomatoes in a sort of hydroponics system. But all that didn't matter. Everyone was there for the house reef. Taj gave up the property after 10 years but I think it's still operating.

Thirty years later the Maldives have developed far beyond any sustainable level - hardly anyone gives much thought to the marine environment and it seems hardly anyone even goes into the ocean. Why would you if you have a pool hanging over the water? People go for the privacy, the spas, the luxury of their villas, the high-end dining etc. Because of this, luxury hotels are usually built in marine deserts, where there is no reef, and this is especially true of the resorts with overwater bungalows - and that's most of them these days. Overwater bungalows are ecological disasters in so many ways - tiny specks of sand can now accommodate huge numbers of guests, making the resorts financially viable and leading to an increasing number of islands turned over to smouldering landfill sites. Add to this an unsavoury government and the ravages of climate change which is wiping out entire reef systems, I do wonder why anyone would want to go there anymore.

My advice is to find a resort with a decent house reef (use Google Earth for this) and no overwater bungalows. Soneva Fushi might be the best option. I think even Baros has OWBs.

The best snorkelling these days is to be found in Micronesia, the Solomon Islands, New Guinea and parts of Indonesia. Even more remote are places like Ducie in the Pitcairn Islands (the best ever for me) and I remember Simon Reeve and a TV crew saw amazingly healthy reefs in British Indian Ocean Territory. There are no luxury hotels in these areas. Is that a coincidence?