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Published: March 30th 2013
After having booked for three dives the previous days, I woke up early in the morning and headed out to the "Divine Diving" shop. There I met the two Indonesians who would be our guides that day – Juffens and Hila. The other divers that day were Bruno and Josette, a Swiss couple in their mid-sixties and Nick and Sofie, a Dutch couple about my age.
The first thing to do was go to an office in the harbor and pay the 95.000 IDR entrance to the Komodo National Park (valid for 3 days) and then get on a small boat that would take us to the dive boat.
We had a full Indonesian crew that day: the guides and the 4 people that worked on the boat.
The boat was very similar to the one I did a 4 day trip in from Lombok to Flores. The front of the main deck was the dive deck, then going to the stern there was the bridge, cooking area and toilet.
The upper deck had mattresses to lay in the sun and half of it was covered as well.
As soon as we
went onboard we had a safety briefing as well as the description of the main characteristics of the boat. Then, on the way out we had plenty of time to chill and relax; it takes about 1 ½ hours to get to the dive sites.
We had the dive briefing for the first dive site (Batu Bolong) and usually the main concern in the different sites is the strong currents. As we were 5, Juffens took Nick and Sofie (the least experienced divers) and Hila took the other 3 of us. The dive site was spectacular; I don’t think I had seen so many fish in one spot before. We basically followed the slope of an underwater hill back and forth between the spots were the currents were strongest.
After the dive, we had about an hour surface interval and then it was time to dive "Manta Point". This is a drift dive with a very strong current. The divers drift at depths between 10-15m. Along the drift there’s not that much to see, but it’s a popular manta ray spotting place. Apparently, during the last few days, they were seeing at least 5 mantas per
dive. We weren’t that lucky that day, but at least we got to see one – the first one I’ve ever seen, so it was still a great dive for me. At the end of the drift we arrived in a place which had more corals and marine life.
Most of us agreed to do a 3rd dive and during the 1 ½ hour or so surface interval, we had lunch; typical Indonesian food, but it was pretty good.
The third dive was in a site called Tatawa Besar (Big Love) and it was a bit similar to the first dive in terms of marine life; simply spectacular. Lots of hawksbill turtles, sweetlips, a couple of white tip reef sharks, all kinds of butterfly fish, angelfish, nudibranchs, surgeonfish, damselfish, wrasses, etc., etc. The visibility was also pretty good (20–25m I’d say) and what amazed me the most was that colors were very vivid (even reds) at depths of up to 15–17m.
The whole dive operation I thought was very professional and customers well taken care of.
On the way back I had a chance to talk a bit more with
the other divers: Bruno and Josette were retired restaurant owners (they still did a bit of work, sporadically cooking for people at their house). They had been traveling for a lot of years in about 120 countries. Whenever I mentioned a place I had been in or wanted to see, they had already been there. They lived in Montreaux and were close of friends of the founder of the Montreaux Jazz Fesival (who died recently). Bruno worked for that festival almost every year. Josette and Bruno had a lot of stories between the two of them and were eager to share them.
Nick and Sofie were recently married. He was a chef – a food designer – and Sofie was a dance teacher. between Nick and the Swiss couple there was plenty of talk about food.
In the evening, the 5 of us had dinner at a restaurant called “Matahari”. The food wasn’t bad, but the portions were small and Nick, Bruno and I had to order extra main dishes. But we had a really good time.
The second day of diving I was at the dive shop at the same
time. That day, the other divers were Mark, a police officer from Belgium who was now in charge of the Police Canine Department in Brussels, his Korean girlfriend Shun Gi (Don’t know if I’m spelling it correctly) who worked for a computer company in Seoul and Nick, an Australian engineer who worked in coming up with solutions concerning floods and draughts. Our guide that day was Juffens.
We dived in two spots in the northern part of the park: Crystal Rock and Castle rock. In both sites we encountered strong currents. Both dives were excellent, just like the first day. All divers were experienced, so there was no problem with the currents. Among the biggest things we saw that day were a few white tip reef sharks and plenty of giant trevallies hunting, which was very cool.
On the way out I had plenty of time to talk to the rest of the divers and had an interesting conversation with Mark about deep diving.
In the afternoon I had plenty of things to do: get flight tickets to go to Sulawesi the next day, pick up my laundry, pay for the
dives, etc.
After I sorted everything out I went out for dinner. As I was walking by, two German girls asked me if I knew any drivers or good tour agencies because they wanted to cross Flores island and fly out from the other side (Maumere). I offered to help them look for something and that took a good hour or so.
After that, the three of us looked for a place to eat and ended in a local eatery (“warung” as they’re known). The food was just typical Indonesian, just OK, but they paid for the food. One of the girl’s father was Chilean of German descent, so she had half her family living in Chile.
n the morning, I went with Nick and Sofie to the airport (we were staying in the same hostel and had the same flight) to get to Denpasar.
In Denpasar I had to wait about 4 hours for my connecting flight, so I looked about for a place to eat and get online to pass the time.
At about 6pm I did the second check in and I bought a
book in the airport – a story book which goes by the title “Strories”. It’s a type of book I’ve never read before. It’s a compilation of contemporary fictional stories from authors around the world. I’m enjoying it a lot so far.
And then I arrived to Makassar, Sulawesi.
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Edilberto Durano
non-member comment
TRAVEL
Wow. What an experience! It's remarkable and amazing. Ed of HotelNParking.com