The interesting island of Fuvahmulah (also called Foammulah or Fuamulaku) makes up the administrative district of Gnaviyani, a solitary place stuck in the middle of the Equatorial Channel with a population of around 11,000. About 5km long and 1km wide, it’s the biggest single island in the Maldives and one of the most fertile, producing many fruits and vegetables such as mangoes, papayas, oranges and pineapples. The natural vegetation is lush, and there are two freshwater lakes, making it geographically about the most varied place in the country. In recent years the building of a harbour and an airport here has greatly reduced Fuvahmulah’s isolation.
Despite Fuvahmulah’s apparent isolation, navigators passing between the Middle East, India and Southeast Asia have long used the Equatorial Channel. Ibn Battuta visited in 1344, stayed for two months and married two women. Two Frenchmen visited in 1529 and admired the old mosque at the west end of the island. In 1922 HCP Bell stopped here briefly, and noted a 7m-high hawitta. Heyerdahl found the hawitta in poor condition, and discovered remnants of another nearby. He also investigated the nearby mosque, the oldest one on the island, and believed it had been built on the foundations of an earlier structure built by skilled stonemasons. Another old mosque, on the north side of the island, had expertly made stonework in its foundations and in an adjacent stone bath.