At anchor in the bay some locals had come along side us to try to sell souvenirs but Peter noticed that they had a chess set on board and in no time an international chess tournament ensued. Peter played 3 different men for over 3½ hours, they cooked a lunch of rice and fish which they ate together despite Ramadan. Peter is a good chess player and did manage to beat one of the men but 2 of them were too good for him!

Labuan Bajo is the first touristy place we have arrived at in Indonesia with a large number of dive shops. The water clarity is particularly good around here and the strong tides that make their way between the Flores Sea and the Sawu Sea to the south bring plenty of nutrients to feed the reefs. The reefs are mostly in good condition and there are many corals we have not seen before, lots of beautiful soft corals too. There are plenty of small fish but the waters are fished intensively by the locals so there are few bigger fish to see, at least for us snorkellers. Happily we have not seen any of the methods of extreme overfishing that have been reported by others in the past including dynamiting reefs and poisoning them with bleach or cyanide.

On a sadder note the attitude to rubbish seems to be that it will take care of itself. Of course, with the litter chucked in the sea and the watercourses there is a small amount of truth in this as the next high tide or the next rain storm will make the rubbish disappear. Sadly we see a lot of rubbish, including masses of plastic bags, miles from the shore; the impact on turtles in particular is well known. Even the poorest market stall holders want to put everything in plastic bags and express mild surprise when we decline and put our veg straight in our rucksacks. So the problem is not going to go away without a concerted campaign and effort especially by the politicians who want to develop tourism.