Day 4

We got woken up this morning by the crew knocking on our door. I thought that was strange, so checked my phone and it was half past 8. My alarm mustn't have gone off, as I set it for 7am. They said we're at Rinca now and it's time to see the Komodo dragons. I was frantically trying to get dressed and ready. Our little cabin is like a sweat box, there is no room to move in there, and just rushing around made water drip off my face even more. I hurried as I needed to get out of that room. We're above the engine, so when we sail at night, it's so hot in there. Perhaps it was a bad idea booking a cabin, although we have somewhere to store our bags, whereas the others have to store theirs in the basement. I skipped breakfast as it was just a slice of unappetising bread. I wasn't in the best of moods, so just kept myself to myself until i'd woken up properly.

Rinca Island

We had a briefing on this island and were assigned another three guides to look after our group. Rinca is still part of the Komodo national park, but it's a separate island to Komodo. Four Indonesian Islands are the only place in the world where the Komodo dragons can be found in their natural habitat, and we're lucky enough to be visiting two of them. We started our hike today, this time prepared with some water and set off on our hunt for the Komodo dragons. We saw 7 dragons yesterday, so I hope we're lucky enough to see some more today. The park is laid out slightly differently, but still woodland and hills. As we're here early morning, the dragons should be more active too. We walked around for a while, then went through the woods to the waterhole, where we saw a couple of komodos, this time one of them was walking along sticking it's tongue out and flicking it. Perhaps it could smell food nearby! Another one appeared in the distance, so they could really pop out from nowhere, that's why you need a guide, or three! We carried on walking and walked up a hill to a viewpoint which looked out over the islands. It was hard work in this sweltering heat, but I was speaking to Qin, (a Chinese/Canadian) guy about our travels in South America, so that kept our minds occupied. We stopped to look out over the bay and headed back down. We saw another couple of komodos on the way down, which I didn't even notice at first.

Komodo dragons are a member of the monitor lizard family, and are the largest species of lizard in the world. They can grow up to three metres long and can weigh up to 70kg. They have no predators when they are fully grown, but are hunted when they are young and when the eggs are being incubated. They hunt and ambush their prey, which it can locate using it's sense of smell. It delivers a venomous bite, which secretes a toxic protein that is lethal for it's food source. They eat deer, pigs, water buffalo, birds, mammals, any type of meat they can feast upon. Dragons prefer to eat dead carcasses, but if they kill their prey, a single bite will usually be enough for the other animal to die. They hunt alone, but come together to feed if there is enough food for them. It has a forked tongue, which it uses to help detect stimuli and guide it to the food source.

Afterwards, we were allowed to visit the nesting site of a female dragon. We walked through the woods and more waterholes, it was so muddy and walking in flip flops was the wrong footwear choice! John slipped in the mud while crossing a river, so I got him to grab my hand while I traversed it safely, only getting a little muddy. While we were walking here, we saw a female dragon, so our guide let us follow it from a distance of course. Everyone was trying to take a closer look and to get pictures of it, but unless you were at the front of the group, which we weren't, you couldn't see it that well. The guides said it will be going to it's nest where it laid it's eggs. The female Komodo dragons lay around 20 eggs at a time. These eggs are incubated and actually take around 7-8 months to hatch. The young dragons live in trees until they are large enough to be safe enough from predators, as the young ones are very vulnerable. When they are big enough, they leave the safety of their own nest to live as an adult. We didn't get to see any baby Komodo dragons unfortunately. Although on our walk, we did see a fairly small one, which must have only been a few years old.

Komodo dragon in the toilet!

Our time had nearly come to an end, but upon returning to the cafe, there was a Komodo dragon which was walking towards the toilets. It was looking for water and it actually climbed into the toilet to drink some. It was like one of those 'you've been framed' video moments, so everyone got their cameras out and started filming it. Just as we were all doing that, the dragon turned around and started walking towards us, so the guides all told us to get back. They were holding out their sticks as the Komodo approached us, they said it's safer to return to the cafe. At this point, people were still filming the drama unfold! They can run, so you wouldn't want one chasing after you. There were 3 guides all pointing their sticks at the Komodo dragon, so they basically scared it off as it turned the other way when it saw a Macaque, which it then had it's eye on. Drama over, so we all wandered into the hut near the cafe and there were 2 more Komodo dragons on the ground. As we all exited the park, there were no guides there to protect us when we needed them. Let's hope nobody gets attacked by a Komodo dragon one day. It's been a great adventure taking this boat trip to see the dragons, along with everything else we've seen, and one I would definitely recommend. We left to sail onwards to Labuan Bajo; Flores where our boat would drop us off to end our tour.