At the crack of dawn, we left Singapore and headed south to our next country to explore – Indonesia! Now, Indonesia is a huge country made up of over 13,000 islands (6,000 inhabited) – indeed is the 4th most populous country in the world! – and so, obviously, we could only plan to see a tiny fraction of it on this trip. We decided to skip Java, the biggest Island and home of over half of the population (whoa!) after hearing of its traffic and squalor, and spend more of our time further south – namely Flores and Bali Islands.
First stop was Flores to go and find some Komodo dragons! We had to fly via Bali and check back in for a domestic flight to Labuan Bajo, which was a bit of a faff and not exactly cheap – but this was something that Rich had really wanted to do from the outset of dreaming up this whole adventure so it hopefully was going to be worth it.
Arrived in Labuan Bajo early afternoon and had an easy transfer up to our hilltop guest house. Immediately noticed that it was even hotter here (closer to the equator) – but a drier heat, which was a nice change to the previous few weeks of humidity. The guest house was gorgeous – 15 minutes outside of the main town but wonderful view of the bay and very peaceful. Labuan Bajo is not an overly interesting town, and mainly only serves as the start point for the boat trips out to the surrounding islands, so that evening we stayed in the beautiful hilltop hideaway and played scrabble. Our idea of a great night!
The next day we started on our 2 day boat trip to find some Komodo dragons. Once driven down to the quay, we saw lots and lots of boats of varying conditions and, remembering all the horror stories we’d read on the internet, got slightly nervous. But there was nothing to fear – happily our boat was in good condition when we finally got shown aboard!
Rinca Island was first stop after a very pretty 2.5hr motor there. We disembarked and entered the nature reserve to go for our walk (unfortunately, for us and the poor ranger assigned to us, now in the midday sun). Along with our stick-bearing-ranger for protection, we saw lots of the ‘domesticated’ komodo near to the base (a bit of a shame – they say they don’t feed them, but they all looked very lethargic and comfortable around people, which is certainly not natural behaviour). However, because we chose the long trek option (of course!) we also got to see more wildlife including a ‘wild’ Komodo dragon that wasn’t used to humans and sprinted away from us extremely quickly (an amazing sight – they have a top speed of 13mph!). When your guide is also very surprised to see it (and keeps telling all his friends of it) – that’s when you know you’ve seen something special. Overall, seeing the dragons up close was pretty cool – bigger than expected and like a weird cross between snake and mammal. Fun facts we learnt: they are carnivores that live solitary lives, they swallow their prey whole (like snakes) and then spend days/weeks digesting it, and when born they go live up a tree for a couple of years so that they don’t get eaten by their parents!
After the hike, we got back on boat for delicious lunch and motored on to a little cove for some snorkelling. After Rich had seen every fish in our part of the sea (he loved it) we headed on to the cove we were to anchor for the night. On the way, as the sun was setting, we came across a pod of dolphins who swam alongside and did tricks around us – amazing doesn’t come close! As it went dark, anchored in our sheltered cove, there was only 1 other boat in sight and we lay on the roof looking at the starry night sky, basking in the silence. If only one of us knew anything of astronomy… After it had been dark for a couple of hours, and we were playing some card games on deck after another delicious meal, more boats started coming in and anchoring around us. We had no idea how they navigated in the dark – but they were also playing very loud music – so our crew decided to move us away to another deserted cove – also completely in the dark! They must know these waters like the back of their hand as, even when they had to move us again twice during the night for a slipped anchor, they were not ruffled at all!
Very early start the next morning to set off for Komodo Island for another trek. We hadn’t slept well that night because of the heat without aircon (Rich even tried to sleep on deck!) but as we approached, we were joined again by numerous pods of dolphins out for their morning swim. There must have been over 50 dolphins surrounding us – amazing sight first thing in the morning – and quickly dispersed any grumpy feelings we may have had. On Komodo Island (National Park), we went on another trek – again choosing the longest one (the guides always looked slightly miffed that we weren’t going for the short 20min loops!) – but it meant that we got away from any other big groups on treks and gave us chance to see lots of water buffalo, deer, and some more Komodos. Given that they don’t promise that you will see any of the dragons during your visit, we saw a lot of them over our two hikes, so Rich was very happy!
The rest of the day we spent finding numerous places of good snorkelling. Firstly, a sandbar where loads of huge manta rays hang out. Rich was straight in and loving getting up close and personal with them (Jeni braved a quick dip and look – but that was more than enough with the scary things) and then on to a gorgeous white sand island with bajillions of fish and coral. I swear Rich would have grown gills and joined them if he could – the only thing that got him out of the water was his wrinkly hands!
By the time we got back to Labuan Bajo that evening, we were overwhelmed by how wonderful the last couple of days had turned out to be; both from getting to see the Komodo dragons, but also thoroughly enjoying feeling properly disconnected and relaxed on the boat. That said, it was nice to get back to the air conditioning of the hilltop guest house that night for a proper night sleep!
Overall – definitely one of the highlights of the trip so far and one we would recommend to anyone thinking of traveling to this neck of the world.
Jeni & Rich go travelling 2016 