What’s the best way to see Komodo National Park? By boat, of course! Komodo National Park is a series of islands off the coast of Flores, one of Indonesia’s biggest islands. The main harbor for Komodo National Park boat tours is in Labuan Bajo. [If you aren’t interested in planning your own trip and just want to read about our experience, feel free to skip to “What happens on the tour?” Also, we are not a tour operator and we were not compensated by any tour agency to write this post. We just wanted to share our experience and answer any questions you might have!]
Article Contents
Getting to Komodo National Park
When and Where to Book Your Tour
What to Know Before Booking
Komodo National Park Packing List
Tour Itinerary: Day 1
Tour Itinerary: Day 2
What’s the best way to get to Komodo National Park?
You can fly from Denpasar (Bali) to Labuan Bajo (Flores) on multiple airlines; prices generally range from $60 to $75 USD for a one-way ticket. You can also take a boat tour from Lombok (the island between Bali and Flores) to Labuan Bajo, which generally takes four days and three nights. (If you choose this option, you might not also want to do a liveaboard boat in Komodo NP as described in this post, depending on where your 4D/3N boat stops. But you might still find this post useful for general information and our experiences at certain places along the way.)
Note: We visited Komodo National Park in January 2020. Currently, there are plans to increase the fee to visit Komodo Island to around ~$250 USD in 2023. Please be sure to research the current tourism situation at Komodo Island before booking any tours. Even if Komodo Island costs an exorbitant amount of money, see if other islands in the national park are charging lower fees. We didn’t even visit Komodo Island on our tour, and we still saw the Komodo dragons [pictured above] and had a great time.
How far ahead should you book your tour?
Although you can find many Komodo National Park boat tours online, we recommend waiting until you arrive in Labuan Bajo to book your trip, mostly for the price. Whereas day trips online cost upwards of $120 USD per person, we were able to book a 2D/1N boat tour in person for only $65 USD per person, so the in-person savings are pretty huge.
The caveat to this would be if you want an air-conditioned cabin. If you don’t want to sleep on the deck, you might need to book before your arrival, or there may only be deck space left. If budget is not a huge issue for you, you can opt for a private boat tour, which will cost you upwards of $400 USD pp, and you can usually book those a day or two before in person.
What questions should I ask before I choose a tour?
When booking a boat tour for Komodo National Park, be sure to get the following information:
• What meals are included? How about snacks or drinks? Is filtered water unlimited? (On our tour, all meals were included, plus an afternoon snack and unlimited coffee, tea and water. We still recommend bringing some snacks as you don’t control meal times, and there were times we got hungry.)
• Are tickets to Komodo National Park included? (Most boat tours don’t include the ticket prices, and they cost almost as much as the tour itself! In addition to the entry fees, there are individual fees for rangers, hiking, snorkeling, etc., on the different islands, so the fees can add up. When we visited, it was about $45 USD per person for two days’ admission and activities, and we needed enough cash on hand to pay for the tickets from the boat.)
• Is snorkeling gear included? (It should be!)
• What is the maximum capacity of the boat and how many passengers are already booked? (And of course–where will you be sleeping?)
What should I pack?
We recommend leaving your bags at your accommodations in Labuan Bajo and only taking what you need on the boat. This includes:
• Basic toiletries (pretty much just toothpaste and deodorant, as there was no shower on our boat)
• Something to sleep in (modest, as we were sleeping on a deck with others)
• Swimsuit
• Towel
• Sunglasses & hat
• Sunscreen (reef-friendly if possible!) & bug spray
• Book/cards/games for offline entertainment
• Portable battery pack
• Sarong or another easy swimsuit cover-up
• Comfortable shoes and clothes for a few gentle hikes (our Teva sandals were sufficient)
• Snacks and soft drinks/beer if you want more than what is available on the boat
We were limited to what we already had in our backpacks for the entire year (see Megan’s packing list here, see Jonathan’s here), but if we were on a shorter trip, the following items would have also been useful:
• Rash guard
• Water shoes
• Dry bag
What happens on the tour?
Of course, this will vary slightly depending on which tour you pick, but most liveaboard trips visit the same popular places. Below is a detailed itinerary of where we went and what we did during our 2D/1N tour. If you are interested in booking a longer and/or private option, check out Organized Adventurer for a review of a 3D/2N private liveaboard boat tour in Komodo National Park.
Day 1
8:30 a.m. | We met at our tour operator’s office (Alexandra Komodo Tour) to get our snorkeling gear and be led to the boat, which was docked at Labuan Bajo Harbor.
9:30 a.m. | After a short delay (one group thought they had booked a private boat, so be sure to double-check with your tour operator if you want a private tour!), we departed from the dock to start our tour.
10:45 a.m. | The ride to our first stop was a little bouncy over the open water, but nothing unbearable. We spent about an hour at our first stop, Kelor Island. There was a small boat that took passengers to the island for a short hike, but we opted to snorkel right off the big boat for the entire stop. (Others who went on the hike said there was not much to see, so sounds like we didn’t miss out!)
12 p.m. | We had lunch (steamed rice, noodles and one fish and one veggie entree) on the boat on the way to our next stop, Menjerite Island [pictured above].
12:45 p.m. | We arrived at Menjerite Beach for an hour of snorkeling before leaving for the highlight of the day: Rinca Island!
3:15 p.m. | We arrived on Rinca Island, part of Komodo National Park, around 3:15 p.m. The national park entry fees were not included in our tour, so our guide collected our cash (600,000 IDR pp) during the boat ride to Rinca and bought our tickets on arrival.
Our time on Rinca Island included a guided walk around the island to see the famous Komodo dragons. You are pretty much guaranteed to see dragons near the rangers’ office on this island, but we were also fortunate to see some on our hike. There are few lengths of ranger walks available on Rinca; our tour included the hour-long walk, which takes you to the top of the island [pictured above]. You can see your boat in the harbor from this viewpoint.
The hike ends at the rangers’ office, where you can take some touristy photos with the dragons and also buy cold drinks or snacks. We bought some postcards at the rangers’ office, but I saw the same postcards at the Labuan Bajo airport for about 25 percent of the price so … I advise you wait to buy postcards. 😉
5 p.m. | Our tour of Rinca Island ended around 4:45, and we were back on the boat by 5 p.m. to head to our sunset spot: Kalong Island. The boat staff greeted us with a snack of fresh fruit when we boarded the boat—yum!
6 p.m. | We arrived at Kalong Island, also known as the “flying foxes island,” to watch thousands (millions?!) of flying foxes leave the island at dusk to find food on another island. (Spoiler alert: The flying foxes are bats. Huge, terrifying bats. But it is pretty amazing to see their nightly migration!) We watched the bats from about 6:15 to 6:40 p.m., then it was time to move on to our sleeping spot. Dinner was similar to lunch (rice, noodles and two “main” options).
FYI, all meals were served on the front deck of the boat [indicated by the yellow arrow in the below photo], which is also where many passengers chose to sit and hang out during our trips between stops.
8:45 p.m. | We got into bed around 8:45 p.m., while we were still headed to our final destination for the day, so I’m not sure when we actually arrived at our docking point. There were 21 passengers on our boat, but only six of us slept “open air” on the dock, so I guess there was enough room for 15 passengers in the AC cabins (plus crew quarters) belowdeck, which was surprising!
I neglected to take a photo of the sleeping deck [circled area in above photo], which is a bummer because it was actually quite comfortable. There were four double mattresses laid out (one of ours was empty, but another couple said they came up during the night to use it because the AC in the cabins turned off, so maybe the open-air deck is actually a better option), and the crew made the beds up with sheets and pillows before evening. I actually slept much better than I expected—more soundly than I have on some camping trips and overnight bus/train trips, so nothing to complain about here.
Day 2
5:30 a.m. | The crew woke us up before sunrise for a hike on Padar Island (also part of Komodo National Park, so part of our 600,000 IDR entrance fees were for this island). The hike is fairly steep at parts but not too long; we reached the top [view pictured above] in less than 30 minutes. From the viewpoint, you can see three beaches with different-colored sands: pink, white and black [clockwise from top left].
7:15 a.m. | The sun rose while we were at the top, so it was much lighter on our hike back down [pictured above]. We headed back to the boat and departed for our next stop around 7:15 a.m. Breakfast was served on the way. (Instant coffee, tea and filtered water were always available for self-service on the lower deck.)
9 a.m. | After a pleasant boat ride (during which we saw several pink beaches from the boat), we stopped at one for an hour of snorkeling and sand-gawking. I had seen many edited photos of pink beaches on social media, but I also knew those photos were super-saturated, so I honestly was pleased at how pink the sand was in real life [unedited Go Pro footage pictured above].
11:30 a.m. | We arrived at Manta Point for the most epic snorkeling of the trip: manta rays AND a sea turtle!! [The above photos are stills from our GoPro footage, so apologies for the low quality.] When Jonathan and I first jumped off the boat, the crew started calling to us and pointing straight down—there was a HUGE manta ray swimming right below us. It was awesome. We also saw three more manta rays and a sea turtle at this spot.
1 p.m. | We had lunch a little after 1 p.m. on our way to our final stop. We could not visit the location originally listed on our tour description because the current was too strong, so we visited Angel Island instead. (Note all tour operators for liveaboard boats in Komodo National Park reserve the right to exchange or skip spots based on water conditions; luckily we were still able to visit Manta Point, which is apparently a common trouble point that boats skip.)
3:45 p.m. | We arrived at Angel Island for one last bout of snorkeling and left around 4:30 to return to the dock.
5 p.m. | We arrived back at the Labuan Bajo Harbor around 5 p.m. and returned our snorkeling gear to our tour operator by 5:30 p.m. It was then time for a shower and fish tacos with our new Dutch friends we met on the boat!
Overall, our overnight boat tour in Komodo National Park was definitely one of the highlights from our two weeks in Indonesia, and we highly recommend the experience. If you have a boat with a shower and air-conditioning, you might want to consider a 3D/2N trip, but we thought the 2D/1N was plenty sufficient for us. It seems like the longer boat trips just stop at more snorkeling/hiking spots, and we were happy with the amount we did.
Any questions? Please feel free to comment below or contact us directly if you have a more personal question.
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