Flores - From Maumere to Labuan Bajo

My flight from Bali took me to Flores, specifically to Maumere. My goal was to travel across Flores from Maumere and arrive in Labuan Bajo after over 500km.

In Maumere, I explored the city a little, enjoyed the time by the sea, and visited the night market in the evenings, where you can eat wonderfully delicious and cheap food.

Then I continued by bus to Moni to visit the Kelimutu volcano. The next morning, we climbed the volcano very early in the dark. Seeing the three lakes in the crater at sunrise was an impressive experience.

Afterwards, we headed towards Ende. Ende is a fairly large city surrounded by water on one side and mountains on the other sides. In Ende, I was in an area where there were only locals and very few spoke English. But it was great to sit on the black sand beach and watch the locals swim, build sand castles, or play football.

The next day, we continued towards Bajawa. We made a brief stop at the Blue Stone Beach, which was really beautiful. Then we continued to Bajawa. Bajawa is a small sweet city where you can find traditional villages and hot springs nearby. Due to lack of time, I skipped the hot springs as the next day we were already heading towards Labuan Bajo. The journey was super exhausting, as I sat in an overheated car with 7 locals and 2 chickens for almost 12 hours.

Arriving in Labuan Bajo, I immediately felt comfortable, although the city, a port city, is not really the most beautiful. But there I met so many new people. I took a 2-day, 1-night boat tour to the Komodo National Park where you can not only admire the Komodo dragons but also many beautiful islands with their beautiful beaches. I also went diving there for 3 days, and those were by far the most beautiful days since the beginning of my trip. Rarely do you find such colorful corals and fish as there. The fact that Indonesia has one of the most beautiful diving areas was clearly evident here.

Facts: Indonesia has 4000 species of underwater creatures, while the Red Sea has only 1000 and the Caribbean has only 400.

My special highlight was diving multiple times with the 3-5 meter long manta rays, which I really fell in love with! 💙