Greetings from the island of Flores. This tiny island is east of Bali and is quite under-developed. Their main street is very similar to a back alley in America.

This morning a few of us rented a boat for a day trip to Komodo Island, home of Komodo National Park, itself home to the famed komodo dragon. These ugly beasts might appear slow, slothy, and boring in photos, but in reality … they’re exactly the same. They don’t move or do anything exciting. But they do have viciously sharp talons and very powerful tails that can snap goats in half. Unfortunately we didn’t see any of that action, and I wasn’t even allowed to get next to him for a photo.

On the way back we had our boat stop at one of the tiny islands for beach and snorkel time. Islands like these are abundant here, and nearly all have untouched white sand and luscious green flora. They are also completely uninhabited. The one we stopped at, pictured below, would have taken us at most 15 minutes to walk around its perimeter.

After a good snorkel we made our way home in our boat, which I should mention may possibly be the slowest thing ever to move on water; I think ducks were swimming faster. Not a problem, however, since we all sprawled out and fell asleep with ease. As we docked, we were greeted by an army of very young, very short, and very naked local children … all of whom enthusiastically rushed our boat, climbed aboard, and tried to impress us by jumping into the water. Definitely the most amusing part of the day!

One of the little guys showing us his skillz.

That evening, we recovered from this tiring day with lots of beer and cards.