Who would have thought that someone like me—who is terrified of geckos and mice—would actually pay money to see their relatives: lizards and bats.
My trip to Komodo came with plenty of regrets, like not getting to see a truly majestic dragon up close. But it also left me with plenty of unforgettable moments: the thousands upon thousands of bats flying across the sunset sky over Kalong Island, the torrential storm at sea deep in the night, and the liveaboard that felt like the Orient Express on water...
WALLACE'S LINE
Indonesia accounts for just 1% of the world’s land area, yet it is home to 10% of the world’s flowering plants, 12% of its mammals, and 17% of its reptiles, amphibians, and birds.
It even holds an important place in biological history. There is a major species boundary here: the Lombok Strait near Bali, and the Makassar Strait.
In 1854, while surveying the Malay Archipelago, the British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace noticed major differences between the species found on nearby islands. Between Bali and Lombok, and between Borneo and Sulawesi, it was as if an invisible line separated the life on either side.
To the west of the line are typical Oriental realm animals, similar to those of Southeast Asia. On the other side, however, many unfamiliar Australasian species suddenly appear. Bali and Lombok, for example, are only 30 kilometers apart, yet they share just 50% of their bird species.
This suggests that during the Ice Age, falling sea levels once connected Bali to the Asian continent and Lombok to Australia, while the ocean barrier between them remained—creating such strikingly different distributions of plants and animals.
Wallace later wrote up these discoveries and reflections in a paper and sent it to Darwin. When Darwin realized that someone on the other side of the world had arrived at a theory similar to his own, he pulled out his long-shelved research, and the two were jointly published in the Journal of the Linnean Society.
Darwin would later publish On the Origin of Species, prompting humanity to rethink its worldview, while Wallace’s travel classic The Malay Archipelago also became a landmark of natural exploration.
So many of the great exploration stories of the nineteenth century were driven by human curiosity about nature and life. Following in those footsteps and witnessing the wonders of nature with your own eyes—isn’t that one of the meanings of travel?
KOMODO
Komodo, the destination, lies just to the right of Wallace’s Line.
If 100 people go to Komodo, all 100 are going to see the dragons. The Komodo dragon, formally known as the Komodo monitor, is the largest living lizard species in the world—perhaps also the closest living thing we can see to a dinosaur (?).
Komodo dragons are dangerous. One common theory is that their saliva contains more than 100 kinds of bacteria, and a bite can easily lead to sepsis. Even if the attacked animal manages to escape, it may still collapse from infection, allowing the bloodthirsty dragon to track it down at leisure. So for women on their periods...
Several islands in the Nusa Tenggara archipelago are the Komodo dragon’s only habitat—the one and only place on Earth where they live—and the largest of them is Komodo Island. As more visitors arrived, the authorities simply cordoned off a large surrounding area, called it Komodo National Park, and started charging admission.
Approximately 5700 giant lizards live on these volcanic islands. Their appearance and aggressive behavior have led to their being called “Komodo dragons.” Nowhere else in the world do they exist. They are of great interest to scientists studying the theory of evolution.
UNESECO - World Heritage
Komodo was once closed for a year at the beginning of 2020 because increased human activity had reduced the dragons’ food supply, compounded by poaching. (Apparently someone even managed to steal more than 40 Komodo dragons from the island—which is quite a feat.)
As it turned out, that break lasted more than two years. Every cloud has a silver lining: many islands across Southeast Asia got a thorough chance to recover and regenerate during the pandemic, and now is actually a great time to revisit them.
LABUAN BAJO
Komodo Airport is not actually on Komodo Island, but in a small town called Labuan Bajo on neighboring Flores Island. Its Chinese transliteration is a real tongue twister, but the airport code is easy to remember: LBJ—like LeBron James.
It takes only an hour to fly here from Bali. Bajo used to be a small fishing village, and small fishing villages sometimes get lucky breaks. Shenzhen had its famous circle drawn by an old man; Bajo, meanwhile, benefited from a steady stream of international tourists and became one of the fastest-growing fishing villages in Indonesia.
When you stand in the town center with a Starbucks on your left and KFC on your right, you realize what an “international” fishing village really looks like.
The town is backed by hills and faces the sea, living off the water. From the hillside airport, the road winds downhill, and the busiest main street stretches along the harbor.
If you read travelogues from seven or eight years ago, lodging options in town were still pretty limited. Now high-end resorts are nothing new, and Ayana has already quietly taken root in a hidden corner.
At the office of a local telecom operator, I ran into two guys from Shandong getting SIM cards. They had just arrived to work here on a two-year project. I asked what the project was. “Hotels and resorts,” they said.
We stayed at Seaesta, probably the best hostel in town: clean, well-designed, and stylish. The rooftop pool and bar overlooking the harbor is always the liveliest spot in town at night. Even if you’re traveling with friends, booking out a dorm room and reliving your student days is a lot of fun.
By the time we arrived in Bajo, it was already afternoon. Besides locking in the main event—the liveaboard—there are also a few places around town worth visiting. Around Bukit Amelia there are several hilltops with spectacular sunset views, and Rangko Cave offers a cave-exploration adventure.
We headed to the fishing harbor night market for a big meal. For places that depend on tourism, the pandemic was absolutely devastating. The night market is much smaller now than it used to be, and many of the eateries mentioned in older travel notes are gone or changed beyond recognition. The energy is slowly coming back.
There is basically only one way to cook fish here: grill it. And if it isn’t charred nearly black, it apparently doesn’t leave the kitchen. It’s not much to look at, and it’s not exactly cheap either.
YACHT
Along the harbor’s main street, dozens of travel agencies line up shoulder to shoulder. Some have storefronts, some are more like roaming salespeople, but they’re all middlemen in the end. Since only one boat was heading out the next day, we haggled and picked the cheapest option.
We arrived at the harbor a little after 9 a.m. to a scene buzzing with activity. The crew was busily loading two days’ worth of food onto the boat. Our boat was called MonaLisa, a traditional Indonesian phinisi wooden vessel.
This type of two-masted sailing ship is a symbol of Indonesia’s maritime culture. Perhaps Zheng He’s fleet once included a few vessels like this. Even today, many such ships still sail busily through Southeast Asian waters, and a few years ago they were added to the list of intangible cultural heritage. Taking a heritage vessel to see a natural World Heritage site does have a certain ring to it.
MonaLisa was just an ordinary boat that had been refurbished. Among the most luxurious phinisi yachts sailing around Indonesia, none is more impressive than Prana, under the Atzaró brand. It’s the kind of boat that instantly lands on your wish list. At nearly $20,000 per night, it’s basically fit for the Pirate King.
When I boarded, I found everyone else had already arrived: four Dutch editors living in Bali, an American-Australian couple, a girl of Ecuadorian-Chinese mixed heritage, a young Belgian engineer, an Indian textile merchant, and me. It reminded me of Poirot’s description in Murder on the Orient Express:
All around us are people of different classes, nationalities, and ages. For three days, these complete strangers are gathered together. They live under the same roof, unable to separate from one another. At the end of the three days, they go their different ways, and perhaps they will never see each other again.
We set sail, and our first stop was Kelor Island (Kelor? “Coke Island”?), where we climbed a hill that wasn’t especially high but was fairly steep. It was noon, brutally sunny, and even with the postcard-perfect blue sea and sky all around us, the heat was hard to bear.
So I hurried into the water. I really admire foreigners: no matter where they are, give them a beer and a coconut and they can instantly start having a great conversation.
All four Dutch people actually spoke Indonesian. If I hadn’t been on the same boat with them, I wouldn’t have realized just how long the Dutch had colonized Indonesia; the Dutch East India Company even predated the British version.
Then again, isn’t that exactly how it went in The Sword Stained with Royal Blood, where Yuan Chengzhi ultimately reclaimed a large island near Boni that had been colonized by the Dutch? Boni was the old name for Brunei in this region.
Because of the tangled Dutch-Indonesian history, many Dutch people of their grandparents’ generation had spent their childhoods in Indonesia, while at the time of Indonesian independence many Indonesians also caught the “last boat” to the Netherlands. Two of the four companions were of Dutch-Indonesian mixed heritage, and both had striking looks: the man looked like Tom Cruise, and the woman like Natalie Portman.
In the Netherlands today, you can find some of the most authentic Indonesian food in Europe. Likewise, in Indonesia, don’t be surprised to run into lots of Dutch tourists.
The liveaboard included breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and by the time we got back it was lunchtime. We ate Indonesian food in the sea breeze, though both the presentation and the taste were pretty underwhelming.
After lunch, the entertainment was cliff-jumping off the side of the boat and snorkeling. I felt too lazy to move, so I stayed on board and practiced Spanish with my half-fellow-countrywoman from Ecuador.
The girl lived in Colorado. Even though her father was Chinese, she had never met him, didn’t speak Chinese, and was completely unfamiliar with China, so I tried my best to teach her a little about the country that made up half her heritage.
Pointing at the photo below, she said: now you understand the essence of the Spanish word siesta, right?
In the middle of our conversation, the Indian guy came back furious. He had gotten sunburned. Fifteen minutes earlier he had confidently said there was no need for sunscreen: “I'm from India. I think it's OK.” “I think it’s OK” really are the famous last words.
Before I knew it, the boat had reached Kalon Island. Compared with the somewhat uneventful afternoon, watching the sunset bats at Kalon was the highlight of the day.
I’d been afraid of bats since childhood; Hotel Transylvania helped ease that fear just a little.
Halfway there, we spotted a solitary tree standing out at sea.
Several boats were floating nearby, rocking with the waves. We sat in the stern in silence while the crew played mellow Indonesian music, quietly waiting for the bats to leave the forest.
As the sun was about to drop below the horizon, a few impatient bats began to emerge. Locals called them flying folks. They were quite large, like people wearing wingsuits.
Then they started pouring out from one spot in the forest in great waves, as if there were a portal there, and then hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands flew overhead.
These bats were actually fruit bats, vegetarians that don’t drink blood, only fruit and plant juices. They keep late hours, heading out at sunset and returning at sunrise every day. They’re only found on this side of Indonesia and are considered endangered. Judging from their numbers here—conservatively, in the hundreds of thousands—they didn’t seem especially endangered to me.
Even though their relatives very likely caused the world to shut down for more than two years, lying on the deck and quietly taking in such a spectacle was still unforgettable.
We were still sailing after nightfall. Not wanting to go back to our cabins, we lay directly on the deck and drifted off to sleep to the sea breeze mixed with the sound of the engine. In my haze—or maybe in a dream—I felt like I could still see the stars.
At four in the morning, the torrential rain over the sea arrived right on schedule, and I only jolted awake after half my body was soaked.
高潮 HIGHLIGHT
I scrambled back to the cabin in the downpour and squeezed in beside the young Belgian guy for a wonderfully satisfying second sleep. One advantage of a liveaboard is being among the first to land on Padar Island and begin the day.
The rainy season was still bothering us, and a light drizzle fell as we landed on the island. As we climbed the steps, the weather gradually cleared, so we slowed our pace and let the sky set the rhythm.
Padar Island is slender and beautifully shaped, and the three beaches formed by its three bays just happen to be three different colors.
As we gained elevation, the black beach came into view first, then the white one, then the pink one.
At the top, all three colors appeared at once; together with the island’s green and the sea’s blue, it felt like the climactic movement of an entire symphony.
Nature’s craftsmanship is unbelievable.
We took a closer look at the pink beach. Unlike Australia’s pink lakes, which get their color from algae, this one is formed by white sand mixed with red coral fragments worn down over the years. Nature suddenly turned into a genius colorist.
I wanted to fill a little glass bottle with sand and take it with me, but the only thing I was allowed to take away was the memory of the pink beach.
The beach was brutally sunny, so we ended up soaking in the water and chatting again. Somehow, on this sweltering island, the conversation turned to snow and ice. We were clueless about the difference between a skater and a skier, and it turned out the American guy had actually been on a junior national team. His reaction to watching the Winter Olympics was basically: I shared a room with that person, trained with that person, and I even know Eileen Gu.
What an unexpectedly talented group on one boat.
At last, we headed for Komodo. The whole two-day itinerary was for this moment, though whether it paid off still depended on luck being on our side.
We went deep into the dense forest in search of a mysterious, primitive, bloodthirsty beast. It sounded like something straight out of an adventure game, but the gap between the promotional fantasy and the real experience was pretty wide.
Because of the danger, every small group of visitors is escorted by two park rangers, one in front and one in back, and can only follow one of three designated hiking routes. The routes vary in length, from half an hour to two or three hours.
I was full of anticipation when we first entered the forest, but when we reached the pond where Komodo dragons often come to drink and hunt for food, there was not a single dragon in sight. My heart sank. The rangers probably did not want to keep hiking either, so they deliberately said that we were unlikely to see any dragons on the trail today, that on rainy days the dragons go warm themselves on the beach, and that they would take us there instead.
I thought we were heading to some beach farther away, but in no time we were back at the starting point. Turns out the beach was right near the entrance.
There lay two bored Komodo dragons, sprawled out like lazy dogs. At first glance I even thought they were crocodiles. Most likely they were kept there on purpose so tourists would not leave without seeing any dragons at all. Big thumbs-down.
So here is a tip: if your guide starts dropping the words “can’t see any” and “beach,” insist on finishing the hike. No matter what, you will end up back at the beach anyway.
Otherwise your jungle adventure turns into an elementary school field trip to the zoo.
I was pretty disappointed. Even the huge lunch spread could not rescue my mood. In the end, only chasing two giant manta rays helped me recover a little.
The currents near Komodo are seriously strong. Swimming against them felt like Yang Guo practicing his Melancholic Ecstasy Palm in towering waves. And if our boat disappeared from view, it really did make the heart sink a little.
After the manta chase, we started the return journey. We got back to the port at Bajo much later than expected. The crescent moon hung over the harbor, and deep in the night the lights glittered brightly.
One more click of the camera, and then it was time for everyone to go their separate ways again.
So that was Komodo, with a final wave goodbye. See you again in Bali.