Agatti

Agatti lies 459 km west of Kochi, a coral island barely a kilometre wide at its broadest and 7.6 km long, curving around a lagoon so shallow and clear that the boats look suspended in air. Its airstrip, built on reclaimed reef at the southern end, makes it the doorway to the whole archipelago: everyone bound for Bangaram, Thinnakara or Kavaratti passes through. The island's roughly 8,000 residents are Muslims who speak Jeseri, a dialect of Malayalam, and who fish tuna the old way, with pole and line and live bait, a method that has kept Lakshadweep's stocks healthy while purse seiners emptied other seas.

Life runs between the mosques, the school and the fish-drying yards, and there is no alcohol on the island. Days here are spent in the water. The house reef drops from ankle-deep sand flats to a coral wall within a few hundred metres, and dive schools run boats to sites where reef sharks, turtles and shoals of fusiliers move through unbleached table coral.

Kalpitti, a bare sandbank islet off the southern tip, is the best snorkelling spot and the classic sunset walk. In the evening the lagoon turns milky pink, the muezzin calls across the palms, and the last flight of the day lifts off over the reef.