The World According to Keri

I'm back!

I've been quite a slacker with the posts since bumming around on Gili Trawangan in Indonesia. It was hard though - once I went east of the island, I was without internet until Hong Kong. So you know what that means... another long entry! Yay!

Sooo... after the Gilis I joined Indonesia's biggest tour company, Parama, for their popular 3-day/2-night Komodo Island boat tour. It didn't start off so good. The first day involved driving accross Lombok Island in a hot mini-bus with 24 other guests. Oh no - 25 people are gonna be on this boat??? That's a lot of people... this is gonna suck. During this initial bus ride we stopped at a convenience store and a shopping mall. Oh no - this is a typical 'cart people around and make them shop and then get them all back on the bus in a hurry' tour... this sucks. Then we stopped at a village where traditional Lombok pottery was made. I do like pottery, but am I supposed to carry it around with me during this tour? So again we were just dropped off, we looked around, then loaded back on the bus. The last tour stop was the Parama office where we jumped off, looked at a Parama boat in the making then were greeted by Mr. Parama himself along with some nice ladies with tea and banana fritters. A little better, but at this point we were all just a little annoyed and ready to get on the boat. But there was one last strange item on the itinerary. We were told about the new flashy Parama boat that would be their main boat in 2008. It was sitting at one end of the pier while the current lack-lustre boat (our vessel) was at the other. Why on earth are they trying to show us a great boat that we won't be taking??? "On your right is a wonderful boat with that is bigger, better, and has air-conditioning. On the left is the one you'll be taking." What the...? Some people were just pissed off at this point and most of us just ignored the guide and went straight for our little old ship. Once on board, we were given a little orientation speech, at which point I discovered that as a 'deck sleeper', I didn't get the daily free drinks and snacks that the 'cabin' people got. Not happy. This was not a cheap tour. Thankfully, from then on it just got better and I had an amazing time. I couldn't have asked for a better crowd of 24 fellow travelers. I met really cool people and the crew was a lot of fun.


Parama Crew


The lot of us

The first stop was a small island owned by Parama where we played beach volleyball, snorkeled amongst some very colourful coral, and had dinner by a fire. The Irish brothers (Robin and Brian) and I had some good laughs about how Mr. Parama seemed an awful lot like a cult leader making his boys sing praises to him and perform group dances on his behalf. And then the different nationals were asked to sing songs from their country. Thankfully, the group consisted primarily of Dutchies and they did most of the singing. However, I quickly learned that the one other Canadian (Jay) was a bit of a camper boy and was eager to throw out some 'Down by the Bay' and other cheesy camp songs. I was very grateful when song time was over and I was left unscathed. Btw, Jay turned out to be a really nice funny guy who was a pleasure to be around.

The 'main objective of the program' was to 'hunt Komodo Dragons... by camera' (these are actually Parama quotes). I expected a platform similar to the Orangutan one in Borneo, where you all stand together and look over some dragons being fed and take your pictures. I was pleasantly surprised when the big, scary guide led us along some trails looking for the large lizards along the way. Most of them ended up being around the main tourist building due to the restaurant and food scrap factor. It was very cool. We got up close and personal with the beasts while our guide stood nearby with a long forked stick, which he subsequently used to poke the poor thing in the neck in order to get it off its lazy bum. The dragons were great, but the entire group of islands in Komodo Island National Park is also quite stunning. The final stop on the tour was at 'Red Beach' where the majority of the guests got off and did some snorkeling, while 6 of us were picked up by a dive boat to go off and dive in the pristine waters of the protected park.

Up-close and personal with Komodo


It's bigger than it looks. I'm close to the camera and not exactly close to the lizard.


Komodo Islands

I've heard that diving in Komodo is quite challenging due to strong currents and only for 'experienced' divers. I made a judgement call and considered myself experienced enough and went for it. This would be my last chance to get some diving in and Komodo was known for it's undamaged, colourful coral and spectacular dive sites. I'm so glad I did it. It turned out that currents were minimal that day and I had two wonderful dives. Other than the vibrant colours all around, the main image that stays in my head is of a huge Napolean Wrasse (big fish with a bump on its forehead) swimming next to a completely oblivious fellow diver while he was looking in the opposite direction. The fish's body was the size of the diver's torso. Priceless. The reef sharks swimming right under us and the UFO-like flashing Cuttlefish also weren't bad.

Final stop was the island of Flores where we had one last party on the boat and then parted ways. Thankfully, my great new Dutch friends Anna and Sjuerd stayed on the island with me and were up for a 4-day drive accross Flores to a town called Maumere where I was to fly out of and on my way back home. We also recruited a sweet Aussie girl named Jacqui who I had previously seen in the Gilis. We all hired a car and our young Indonesian driver, Hari, and were on our way.


Sjuerd and Anna in Labuan Bajo (west coast port town of Flores)

The 'main objective' of this trip I suppose was the volcanic landcape of Kelimutu - "Three Coloured Lakes". We got up at stupid-o'clock and headed to the volcano for sunrise. We got there quite early though and ended up walking guideless in the pitch black night under a blanket of stars. Thankfully one of us is a good traveler and had her trusty flashlight on her. Not me... Jacqui. After some good guessing, we found ourselves walking up, up, up to the main viewing area and there we were, on our own to enjoy the sunrise over this incredible landscape. Eventually others came, including a nice couple we had met on the Parama boat 5 days before. So as the name suggests, there are 3 volcanic cones in one area, each filled with a different shade of water. Legend has it that the souls of the departed are dispersed among the lakes - turquoise is for the souls of children, black for the doomed, and the other one I suppose is for everyone else. I'm not totally sure if I got that right, but you get the gyst.