Anchored at Gili Lawa Laut island, North of Komodo island
Leaving Lehok grinno, in the Linta Strait between Padar island and Rinca we experienced huge currents heading from North to south, this was great when we were running with it at ten and a half knots but when we headed back north again it pretty much stopped us in our tracks! Luckily we could we had enough power in the engine to keep us moving at half a knot until the wind picked up just in time to get us out of the narrowest and strongest flow...we were like fish trying to swim up stream and getting no where very fast! Once the worst was behind us we had an enjoyable motor sail to Gili Lawa Laut island just north of the bigger Komodo Island. This has to be one of the most beautiful anchorages we've seen so far in Indonesia with water so clear we could see our anchor dug down in the sand, beautiful coral reef covered in fish and great hikes up the hills overlooking Komodo. This is a very popular spot for the big dive charter boats who spend four days here doing constant dive trips. We took Jimmy & Joern out to a huge rock about half a mile from the anchorage to do a dive, the rock is shaped like an underwater volcano and they were pleasantly surprised of the amount of fish and great visibility. We spent a relaxing night here but today we're heading about 15 miles further west to catch up with friends onboard s/v Antares and s/v Helen Kate.
MONDAY 25TH AUGUST
Anchored at Lehok Ginggo on Rinca Island
Position: South 08*42'210 East 119*39'460
Lehok Ginggo is a huge bay on the western coast of Rinca, surrounded with grass covered hills and lots of white sandy beaches, we anchored next to two small fishing boats off one of the beaches in the South East corner in about 30feet of good holding sand. The first morning we headed ashore and marched around with the machete out and our boat poles at the ready, we saw lots of wild deer, pigs and monkeys but no dragons! After meeting the fishermen, we were adopted by 'Otis', one of the young guys and he took us on extensive hikes into the bushes to continue the search. He thought the boat pole was extremely inadequate (and probably quite funny) so immediately set out to cut us proper poking/protection sticks. Apparently, you need a 6-8 foot branch with a v-fork on the end to push at the dragons necks and noses. We ended up spotting quite a few wondering around in the brush then Otis put up some small bait fish on a string in a tree and told us to head ashore around 11:00am, at 10:45 there they were marching along the beach!
SUNDAY 24TH AUGUST
Anchored at Ranger Station on Rinca Island.
Position: South 08*39'198 East 119*42'855
After a quick dash to the local market at Labuhan Bajo on Saturday morning, to stock up on some fruit and vegies, we pulled anchor and headed out to 'Rinca' one of the two main Islands in the Komodo national park. We'd heard that the ranger station on the north coast was the best place to see the monitor lizards close up so we fought the tides and arrived in the well protected anchorage around 3pm. We headed ashore and parked at the dock, full of wooden tourist boats, then wandered precariously to the ranger huts avoiding all the wild monkeys. We found the station closes at 4pm so we'd missed out on the guided tour but the bar was open and the rangers were more than happy to show us some giant dragons that hung around outside the kitchen hut. They were very serious about us not getting too close as the komodo's are extremely unpredictable and just one bite will kill you! One of the guides stood between us with a long stick forked at the end to protect us if one decided get friendly. The ranger explained that the dragons main food sources are the big water buffalo's and wild deer, they bite them then follow for a couple of days until they die of blood poisoning and then they feast! We were certainly happy at keeping our distance but when Jimmy picked up our guide and threatened to feed him to the pack the other rangers thought it was extremely funny.
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