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August 2001
Komodo and its Dragons
Odv2004-09-15 12:29:19
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Rating: 2.00 out of 5.00. 2 members have rated this article
were surprisingly few tourists.
Kampung Komodo is the only village on the island. It has about 1000 inhabitants. Besides fishing they also craft souvenirs for visiting tourists, and provide them with boat trips to Mangrove Island (to see the flying foxes) and Red Beach (for snorkeling).
The islands Komodo, Rinca and Padar are all part of the Komodo National Park. The park falls under the responsibility of the PHPA, which has two camps one on Komodo at Loh Liang and one on Rinca at Loh Buaya.
On Komodo the PHPA camp at Loh Liang is where visitors go to see the Dragons and where it's possible for visitors to get accommodation and stay overnight. The PHPA also provides guides for tourists and collects the park's entrance fee (20.000 rp. the equivalent of 2.5 Euros). The best rooms cost a whopping 45.000 rp (6 Euros)!
Not the kind of place that will break your budget... But don't expect any luxuries either, electricity works from roughly 18:00 until 22:00, after that it's really dark. There's no warm water either, not that you really need it, and obviously no air-conditioning. The ventilator in the room stops shortly after 22:00 when the electricity is turned off. Of course you don't have the room to yourself, you're sharing it with 30cm long geckos (everything on Komodo is bigger). But this is all part of the charm of Komodo. Not to mention the fact that wild pigs, deer and dragons just walk past your window.
It turned out that most people visiting Komodo, did so on day trips, as you can see on this view of Loh Liang bay (above) there are usually several boats in the bay. Since the chance to see a Komodo dragon during the three hours they spend on the island is actually quite low, they don't know what they are missing. Often they only get to see the dragons that hang around in the camp close to the kitchen. We saw many disappointed faces among the day-trippers and were glad we didn't
...
See photographs from:
Indonesia Gallery
