Dragons, More Monkeys and More Boat Boys - Lehok Ginggo, Rinca Island, Nusa Tenggara Province, Indonesia

Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Sun 5 Sep 2010 09:42
08:42.059S  119:39.587E
 
August 30th we left Labuan Bajo and motored five hours in dead calm conditions to Rinca Island through an area of arid, barren, yet beautiful islands filled with craggy, russet mountain peaks.  The wind was dead calm, but the water through the narrow, deep straits between islands was anything but, swirling around in funky current eddies and whirlpools with the occasional standing wave popping up here and there.  The highest current we saw was 4 1/2 knots.  It was in our favor, and caused us to have flashbacks to Darwin (minus the pounding waves and washing machine effect) as we were swept along.
 
As we approached Lehok Ginggo, a bay on the west side of Rinca Island and our first stop in Komodo National Park, a Komodo dragon and several monkeys came out to greet us on the beach.  By the time we were done fiddling around with our anchor, they were gone.  We had just gotten used to the idea of an anchorage all to ourselves when another dragon showed up followed by a monkey clan of twenty on the beach.  We jumped in the dinghy to get a closer look, but the monkeys were not too keen on the idea of humans at close range so they disappeared into the trees before any pictures could be taken.  We always thought monkeys would be camera hounds, but not this bunch.  The dragon didn't necessarily beg to have his picture taken as he lumbered away from us, but he at least moved slowly enough that we got a few shots.
 
It wasn't long after our dragon encounter that two new sets of Komodo Village boat boys showed up in their putt-putts to sell us more stuff.  When we explained that we already had more dragons and necklaces than two people could possibly need in a lifetime, they fired questions at us concerning potential business.  "How many boats will be coming here?"  "You have some friends coming here?"  "How many boats in Labuan Bajo?"  "How many coming here from there?"  Then, when they weren't completely happy with our inexact answers, they persisted, "You must buy from us."  "You buy from Evan, but now you buy from us."  "We give you cheap price."  "Very cheap price."  The pressure was high, but we didn't relent.  Eventually they gave up and retreated to the far corner of the bay to wait for their next customers.
 
Picture 1 -  Craggy, russet mountain peaks we passed on the way to Rinca Island.
 
Picture 2 -  Motoring through dead calm water.
 
Picture 3 -  The Komodo dragon.  These giant lizards reside only here.  About 1,100 live on Rinca Island and 1,300 on Komodo Island.  That's the whole of the world Komodo dragon population.  We feel privileged to have seen 3 of the 1,100 on Rinca.  They are a protected species and are generally not dangerous although they have been known to attack humans on rare occasions.  Evan told us a child was bitten by a dragon in Komodo Village a few years ago.  He lived for several days, but nasty bacteria in the bite took over and the boy died.  Ugh.  Generally, the dragons eat wild pigs or goats or even water buffalo.  As you can see, these lizards are big, growing up to 9 feet.  And ugly - with a bright yellow tongue constantly flicking in and out of their mouth.  Weird creatures.  We stayed only one night at Rinca and didn't venture ashore.  Since we were such disappointing customers, the boat boys probably wouldn't have saved us had we been bitten.
Anne

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