The Wandering Hart

To finish out our trip we spent about a week relaxing at a couple of resorts in Flores. The first resort, Sudamala, was on a small island called Seraya off the coast of Flores. We spent our time there relaxing at their private beach, enjoying the pool, and snorkeling. My husband also took advantage of the dive center they have there with a 1 hour session for non-certified divers. For anyone who is certified, they had a ton of amazing diving options there! The snorkeling was also great – they have a beautiful coral reef right off their dock.

The Sudamala Seraya was very nice and had great private beaches, snorkeling, and diving. However, the downsides to this resort were that the pool was pretty small and of course you’re on a remote island so you only have access to their resort restaurant for food. The food in my opinion was super overpriced…even with only ordering a two rounds drinks over the course of our few days there we averaged $40 USD by the time we were done per meal! That’s insane for Indonesia! We were particularly unhappy with the way their beach BBQ was run because it was pay-by-weight so it ended up being very expensive and the fish ended up being overcooked. So overall a great option for a few days of really great beach and coral access but I’d recommend not staying for a full week and switching it up – which is what we did!

From the Sudamala we went to the Ayana Resort just outside of Labuan Bajo on Flores Island. The Ayana is a very fancy resort with excellent pools and some access to beach activities like paddleboarding, snorkeling, and kayaking. Similar to the Sudamala the resort restaurants were super overpriced (maybe even a little more expensive), but since we were on the larger island we could taxi into town or order Grab delivery for other food options. We ended up ordering Grab a few times and just shelling out for the resort food the rest of the time.

We ended up having a great time for the couple days we were at the Ayana. We spent most of the time in their awesome pool (sometimes with cocktails from the swim-up bar!) but also took advantage of some of the free resort activities. My husband did some stand-up paddleboarding during the “happy hour” for paddleboards and kayaks (outside of that hour rentals had a fee) and then we both did free sunset yoga on their dock which had a really great instructor. Overall it was a nice stay although I do think we could have gotten a slightly cheaper resort in Labuan Bajo and had an equally nice time – but sometimes you hafta go big or go home!

Annnd sadly going home was what we had to do next. On our way out of Indonesia we got to stop for a day in Jakarta so we toured around and saw their National Monument, which is a beautiful pillar. You can go up in it but we chose to skip that since we had limited time and moved onto the nearby National Museum after looking up at the monument. Their National Museum was really great and had English translations of everything. I particularly enjoyed learning about how diverse the Indonesian islands are – for example each island we went to on this trip had a different majority religion (Bali is Hindu, Flores is Catholic, and Java is Muslim) – and how that developed over time.

After that brief stop in Jakarta we started the 24 hour process of getting back to the United States. We’re now done with our extended travels and back home for a while. It was fun while it lasted but it’s great to be back!