For our long anticipated spring break trip, we chose a true Indonesian adventure - a live-aboard boat cruising around Komodo National Park! We had been looking forward to it for months and the 2 hour flight from Jakarta to Labuan Bajo amped up the excitement even more. When we started flying over islands like this we knew we'd found an amazing vacation spot.
Plus, no flight over Indonesia is ever without amazing volcanoes. Turns out this was Mt. Sengeang and we'd get a great view of it later on our trip.
Welcome to Komodo Airport! We chose to spend our first night in a hotel in the small town of Labuan Bajo so that we could enjoy a full first day aboard the boat.
The beach was nothing to speak of but the pool was nice and vacation relaxing commenced immediately.
Every vacation should start with a rainbow!
Our first sunset over the islands of East Nusa Tenngara.
To give you a brief overview of all the land we covered, I went back and marked out our days. Most of the time we didn't have cell service so we couldn't even look up a map but part of the adventure was having no idea what was ahead.
The boat company picked us up from our hotel and as luck would have it, two other families from school were on our flight, staying at the same hotel, and using the same boat company! We even picked the same restaurant for dinner before we all left.
We loaded up our little dinghy at the marina (later affectionately named the Li'l Leaker by the kids because it constantly took on water) and set out to our boat.
Our living room and bedroom for the next four days. The fresh muffins and brownies were warmly received by the younger crowd!
We set sail from the island of Flores and began our journey! We had a crew of three onboard - the captain, the cook, and the guide. They really didn't tell us anything about what to expect the first day so we were just up for whatever adventures awaited. (And even though it wasn't a large boat, I was amazed at how these guys could disappear and make it feel like we had the boat to ourselves...gotta admit I was a bit worried about being the lone female sharing a bathroom on a boat with 6 males!)
Ready to explore! The breeze and the views on the upper deck were incredible.
We arrived at our first snorkeling stop - Kelor Island.
The water was chilly and clear and we couldn't wait to see what was in it.
Love spotting a lion fish!
The boys enjoyed the snorkeling but can't ever resist digging in the sand. I think I have about a dozen pictures like this on different beaches from our trip.
I found a pretty little gem!
We got back on the boat happy and tired from our first swim and were so excited to find out that wonderful smell was our lunch. Lunches and dinners were quite an event.
I'm not exactly sure where our next stop was but I believe we were on the coast of Flores. There were hundreds of starfish in a variety of colors here.
Pretty fish but the water was a little more cloudy and the waves were a bit bigger, so Alex didn't last long snorkeling.
Instead, the kids discovered their new passion - jumping off the boat.
This never got old for the entire trip. As long as the water was clean and deep, they were flying off.
Our Jakarta friends' boat anchored near us and the kids synchronized their jumps for the rest of the afternoon.
We cruised along to Pulau Papargaran (I think) to catch the sunset and an amazing daily event.
Thousands upon thousands of massive flying foxes take off at sundown each day. It was pretty spectacular.
Not a bad way to wrap up our first day on the water! We stayed out on the deck watching the flying foxes until we couldn't see them anymore and enjoyed the stars appearing.
The boat anchored at Nusa Wainatu for the night so we got to wake up to all new scenery.
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