So those of you who may be following our course on a map might be confused that we chose this time to skip out fantastic Lombok and head straight to (also fantastic) Flores, a few islands further east down the archipelago. Well, it was because of a stroke of good fortune! We were busy trying to book a liveaboard boat for later in the trip, when the company replied and said their poshest boat had a spare cabin and if we took it, we’d get a whopping big discount. Well, you don’t have to ask us twice!

But before we get into it, here is the ninth and final Ambient Travel Vid, featuring many underwater marvels. Unfortunately I can’t film at quite the same quality as overground, but I think the mesmerising motion and the weird and wonderful creatures make up for it.

Day 153 – Arrival to Flores

Upon arrival to the airport in Labuan Bajo, gateway to Komodo National Park, we worked in smooth harmony, a well-oiled machine, an ironclad partnership forged over months of travelling. A car from the fancy boat company picked up Billie and our bags while I ordered a Grab bike to whizz me to the immigration office, certain bureaucracy would find a way to keep me out the country. To my great surprise, I was out of the immigration office with my extension sorted before Billie had left the airport car park. Pretty impressive. We met at the fancy boat office to try on our scuba gear for size and sign our lives away, which we duly did. Our one-night hotel had a lovely view of the bay, and the sunset was a stunner.

Day 154 – Liveaboard Day 1

We arrived at the port to be welcomed by our very lovely guide for the trip, Alice. We were soon joined by another nice British couple around our age, as well as a last minute American guy who so strongly resembled and sounded like Jack Black that I whispered in Billie’s ear “Jack Black is coming on the boat!” and then two minutes later when introducing ourselves he said “My name’s Ryan… not Jack Black.” I guess it was good for him to get the elephant in the boat out the way sharpish. He wasn’t Jack Black, to be clear. We figure he got a deal too, perhaps even better than ours, having walked in off the street last night to fill the last spot. We do not begrudge him for it.

The boat was fancy all right… our cabin had air con, a private bathroom with shower and a comfy double bed. The deck had a big sturdy table where we would share delicious and varied meals and snacks throughout the day, and the upper deck was adorned with beanbags to chill on between dives and activities… if there was time! Our schedule was fairly chocca with 3 dives a day (12 over the 4 day trip) along with a couple of other land-based expeditions to see the dragons and watch a sunset from atop a hill.

The dives on day 1 (spoiler alert: and on every day) were spectacular. Komodo National Park is arguably the best scuba destination in the world and it did not disappoint. The coral is healthy and the marine life is abundant with a capital A. Our first dive in Sebayur Kecil revealed amazing cuttlefish, which we’d never seen before. Alien-like squid resembling fish, they changed colours before our very eyes. Turtles were plenty and the small fish life among the colourful coral truly magical. Bigger fish like giant trevally cruised past us in schools.

Our second dive, Pengah Kecil was an excellent large reef shelf surrounding a small island (big rock) in the sea. Black-tip reef sharks were a highlight, and ever present turtles and other marine marvels surrounded us throughout.

Finally, as the sun set, we embarked to Wienilu for a night dive. We’ve done one of these before, but this one was another experience. Mostly because of the swarming anchovy-like fish that basically attacked us throughout the entire dive. Attracted by the light of our torches, they thronged around us, swimming into us hard, our mask, our faces and into our body generally, felt thumping into us through our swimsuits. They were harmless but to call them a distraction would be doing their performance a disservice. Beyond that we saw some weird and wonderful animals, the type you don’t often see in the day including a big praying mantis shrimp and, the winner of the dive, a tiny octopus that could sit in the palm of your hand, perfect but small, moving around on the floor. It was a delight. I’m afraid no camera came with me on this trip in a bid to concentrate on not getting lost in the sea at night. I hope you understand…

Day 155 – Liveaboard Day 2

It’s big animal day, and we had two targets: Manta Rays and Komodo Dragons. We were up early for the first stop at Manta Point. An encouraging name, no doubt at all, but alas lady luck dealt us a poor hand (if you consider one of the best dive sites in the world a poor hand).  

Komodo dragons were more of a sure thing. We hit up the island of Rinca, where many dwell near a sort of ranger station. We were speedboated to the entrance, and whilst walking along a boardwalk to the entrance, we saw them!

Big ugly lizards, long tongues flicking out constantly when moving, to taste what’s ahead. Otherwise, just lying there, digesting a big meal (they feed once a month and take days to digest).

A guide was assigned to us. He had a wooden stick with a forked end, and that was the sum of our defences should a Komodo try looking to take one of us for its monthly repast. Luckily we, and our limbs, are all still here, and no dragons tried to make any of us into a snack. He told us various things that only compounded my view that Komodo dragons are the most evil creatures in the world. Their bite is strong with venom and terrible bacteria. It’s the bacteria that will slowly kill their prey over a matter of several days, all the while being stalked by the dragon who is patiently awaiting their meal.

There was plenty of other evil stuff, which mostly I forget now, but they were really cool to see. We got fairly close, and it was a little bit suspicious that so many were hanging around right outside the visitor centre. Though they say they don’t feed them, I feel they must do for such solitary creatures to gather in such numbers so conveniently. But they had unfettered access to an enormous island, it was not our battle to fight and it was a great experience to see the evil bastards.

We climbed to a viewpoint on Rinca which was stunning! Sweatily back down to our boat via a beautiful Collared Kingfisher, and to prep for Dive two.

Dive two was in Mawan which, while not named with such unoriginality, came up trumps!

Well, manta rays are bloody incredible let me tell you now. Now officially my favourite animal, I see the reason so many divemasters have their sinuous shape tattooed on various parts of their body (not that I’m tempted to join them). Our dive guide, Bastyan, pointed into the murky blue ahead and my jaw metaphorically dropped (it’s not a great idea to let your mouthpiece fall out while scuba’ing) and I got goosebumps as an enormous manta ray flew out of the gloom. They don’t swim, they fly through the water.

So much bigger than I expected and moving with incredible grace and ease. As I was gaping at that one, the divemaster pointed across to our right and another one swooped past right in front of us and I was giddy with happiness. We plonked ourselves down on the sea floor, basically lying down on our fronts and holding onto a bit of dead coral to stay in place, for the show. We were a respectable distance away from their cleaning station, and there were a fair few other divers in attendance too. They swooped around while wrasses and other fish nibbled away at dead flesh, to keep them prim and proper. Fun fact: different fish have different duties in the cleaning station, so a certain type of wrasse might clean around the mouth, while another fish entirely might nibble on the wings. It takes a large crew comprised of several different species to fully valet a ray. Valet-a-ray would be a great name if only these small fish could set up a business.

Aaaand finally for the day, we had Siaba Besar AKA Turtle Town. This shallow reef, with patches of sandy bottom (ooh I say) was chocca full of turtles, be they munching on grass, snuffling around coral or sleeping. Turtles are incredible and I really love them. Such unique animals and so long living, they are undeniably beautiful and calm. When you come to eye to eye with one, you can’t help but think there’s something going on in there…

After the dive, we moored up on a beautiful tiny beach where we all frolicked and took pictures and eventually grabbed our masks to see the TINY baby sharks skittering about in just shin-height water.

With a gorgeous sunset from the boat accompanied by cold beers and amazing food, a day doesn’t get much better than that, folks. As we went to sleep that night Billie and I agreed that this trip was pretttttty special.

Day 156 – Liveaboard Day 3

Another early start and we were off to Police Corner for our first dive. A legend has it that a big boat-based gunfight with the police happened here, though the story was told with an air of ‘even I don’t believe that’. It was unique for having a cave with a big overhang, where a phenomenon could be witnessed: the fish swim against the rock and coral, and just keep going when they reach the underhang, so they are swimming upside down. So… go under the underhang, look up, and there’s a bunch of upside-down fish going about their business. They care not for gravity, it seems. The floor to them is where the floor appears to be.

We also saw cool nudibranchs and a characterful lionfish.

Tatawa Kecil was dive two. This was a really colourful coral site, and a drift dive. A soft current took us from one end to the other, and it feels a bit like flying. One benefit is you cover more ground (with less effort) so you have a chance to see more. The negative is you can’t really stop to see it for very long. It’s not our favourite way to dive, but can be fun.

Dive three: Spanish Garden, god knows why – you just accept the names after a while. As with all the others, this one was a veritable treasure trove of colourful fish and incredible coral. The highlight is a huge field of garden eels (OK, that’s where Garden comes from, but Spanish?). After lying on the ocean bed and observing their creepy tendril ways, we swam over them, and they would retreat back into their holes as we passed. Very cool.

“Three dives! Surely the day is done?” I hear you cry. Afraid not! Grab a beer and jump in the speedboat, because we’re off to a little island to climb a big hill for an absolutely stunning sunset. I’ll let the pictures do the talking:

Day 157 – Liveaboard Day 4

It was hard to come to terms with the fact that our trip was ending. Today, we’d whizz through our three dives and be back in Labuan Bajo by 4pm. But Alice had a great day of diving planned, with some surprises thrown in for good measure.

The mains surprise was dive one: Shotgun. There was an entire wonderful dive beforehand, but the reason for the name lies in the funfair ride at the end of the dive. There is a channel between two (pretty big) islands positioned closely together. Through this channel is funnelled quite a lot of water, quite quickly. The (dangerous sounding) idea is to swim into that current and be shot out the other end like a shotgun. The reality was less horrifying than it sounds, and we sped up to maybe 20 or 30mph for about 10 seconds, but it felt quick! We also saw a big black-tipped reef shark as we came out the other end, which was cool. I did not take my camera on this one, again in a bid to avoid distraction and disaster.

Our final two dives were Crystal Rock and Tatawa Besar. These were both stunning reef dives, fairly shallow which only helps show off the incredible colours on show. These were possibly our favourite two dives of the trip (other than mantas for me) for the sheer abundance of tiny fish and colour. We have really got into appreciating the underwater landscapes of striking coral, all aflutter with damsel fish and god knows what else.

And so we set off back to Labuan Bajo, fairly well weeping as we packed our bags in the sweet coolth the our aircon’d cabin. We could have easily stayed another couple of days… and we would not have thought that to be the case before we set off. Four days feels like plenty to be confined to a boat… but confined we were not; but rather set free in one of the most beautiful places in the world.

Next time, we hire a big scooter and take on a six-day road trip across the majestic island of Flores. Tune in to see if our butts survive the 700km, 20 hours+ of driving to come.