Komodo: Everything Else

So, I've already told you about the major components of our Komodo trip, namely the boat, the dives and the Komodo dragons themselves.  But there were some other shenanigans that happened on and off the boat throughout the trip.

1. Dolphins! Right before our last dive, Tim caught sight of a couple dolphins breaking the surface near our boat. Willie catered to our whims and directed the dive boat to try to move closer to them so we could have a quick snorkel with them.  While they weren't particularly interested in snorkeling with us, we did catch a couple good glimpses of them. (We may have dolphin video in the near future- Mr. Ben got some good underwater shots).

Turns out there were not just a couple, but 5 or 6 adult dolphins, at least 2 babies, and one dolphin with some sort of tumor or something on his head. 

2. We took a brief hike on one of the small, uninhabited (well, by people) island somewhere between Komodo and Rinca.  There were definitely goats on the island, and we hoped there were definitely no Komodo dragons.

Our dive boat just pulled right up on the beach.  See our liveaboard boat in the background...

We hiked that path straight up the side of the mountain.  Actually pretty steep!

Hikin'

Smilin'

Lookin'

As I said, these islands were really dry... like crispy.  It was a far cry from the soggy Jakarta (it's poured every day here in the city since we returned from Komodo). But the views on the hike were amazing. 

Awesome views.

Hikers in the distance.

Those ripples in the water were a whole bunch of fish jumping around.

3.  No photos of this, but as I said, Ben had a wicked stomach flu while we were on the boat and got sick in the middle of the night.  The next morning he told us that, in the dark of night, he left his cabin and went to the side of the boat to get sick.  Right after throwing up, he saw a large shark swim up to the boat and eat his vomit.  A new type of chum? 

4. There was a huge storm one of the days we were out on the boat... huge.   You could see it looming in the distance for a while, but when it hit the boat, we literally had to batten down the hatches.  

Storm's abrewin'.

The cloud looks like it's going to eat this little boat.

Shelter from the storm?

5. Finally, we did a bit of jumping off the boat into the beautiful water. It was pretty high off the second story of the boat!  Floating in the water, it seemed like you were at the end of the world... so peaceful.