Our plan is to keep going east to the island of Flores with stops to Rinca and Komodo to see the famed dragons roaming free in the wild. The travel time to Flores by bus all together is about 24 hours and both of us have mentally prepared ourselves for the arduous journey through rough but beautiful and rugged land. The only way to see the dragons is by chartering a boat from either Lombok or Flores. We looked at the distance and pricing from Lombok for a 4 day cruise on the sea but instead opted to go on ahead to Flores. Our journey to Flores involved a 15 hour bus journey through the island of Sumbawa and then a 8 hour ferry ride to finally arrive at the harbor in Flores. The public ferry doesn't offer a lot of comfort but its cheap, reliable, and slow but gets you there safely.
Upon arriving at Sumbawa late at night, our bus yet again encountered some mechanical issue and we were stranded outside while our bus sat on the ferry. We waited for an hour after the obligatory smoke breaks were completed by the crew and then miraculously departed. We tried to sleep through the night as the bus rolled on through the tight and twisting turning road. I would often wake up and find a bewitching moon lighting up a Jurassic Park like landscape full of craggy twisted peaks and find my snoring companions or a crying baby trying to snooze close to her mother.
Arrivng at the ferry crossing, we made the journey watching Indonesian version of MTV and some comedy shows, all of course in Bahasa Indonesia. The time was passed writing in our diaries, taking a few pictures, walking out on deck, making faces and playing with the little kids on board.
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