A PUB landlady drowned accidentally while on honeymoon in the Maldives, a coroner has ruled.

Sharon Duval had an alcohol level more than three times the drink-drive limit when her body was found in the sea by a fellow British tourist.

The 42-year-old, who ran the Highwayman in Kidlington, was on the last day of a two-week holiday on the island of Kuredhu with husband Nick when she died on October 2 last year.

The couple had been socialising with fellow honeymooners Adrian and Maxina Salmon just hours before Mrs Duval’s death, Oxfordshire Coroner’s Court heard at Old County Hall yesterday.

The group had dispersed at about 11.45pm and Mrs Duval took a different exit from her husband as they left the bar to walk back to their villa.

Mr Duval told the court his wife had gone in a separate direction but he assumed their routes would meet before their room.

He said: “Sharon had her own mind and she would do things her own way, so we left in two different directions.”

Mr Duval said he waited at some outside tables for about five minutes before thinking his wife had already made it to their room, but could not find her there.

After waiting at the room, he dozed off and woke before dawn and then continued searching.

He said: “I looked everywhere, I walked up and down that island, checked every sun lounger I could find, looked under the hedges and the bushes, went to the ladies’ toilet, walked into the gents’ toilet. I walked all around, just kept looking and looking – I never expected she would be in the sea.”

Mrs Duval’s body was found 300-400m in the opposite direction from the route to her villa, the court heard.

Asked if he had any theories on her disappearance, Mr Duval replied: “I think maybe she fell in and maybe she became disoriented.”

The inquest heard she had severe sunburn and a number of mosquito bites which were causing discomfort, but that she had only paddled in the water during the holiday and would never go swimming in the sea.

In a statement, Mrs Duval’s GP Dr Martin Stubbings said she had been treated for depression since 2004 and took medication for it.

In October 2009 she took an overdose of Paracetemol and Ibuprofen “due to stress at work and her volatile relationship with her partner”, the court heard.

Mr Duval, who had lived with his partner since January 2005, admitted he had once been arrested after one of their arguments – as Coroner Nicholas Gardiner put it – “ended with violence”.

The court heard the arrest was not taken any further.

Pathologist Dr Ashley Fegan-Earl gave the cause of death as drowning with a contribution of alcohol intoxication and ruled out “any form of third-party involvement”.

Mr Gardiner recorded a verdict of accidental death.

tairs@oxfordmail.co.uk