Nusa Kembara

Komodo is where Nusa Kembara is easiest to book and cheapest to join. Trips leave Labuan Bajo on the standard three day, two night rhythm, and because berths are sold individually you do not need a group of sixteen to get on board.

The itinerary is the familiar one and there is no point pretending otherwise: Padar for the sunrise ridge, Pink Beach, Komodo or Rinca for the dragons, Manta Point and Taka Makassar, Kalong for the flying foxes at dusk. What changes between boats is how early you arrive and how long you stay. With two speedboat tenders she can put a group ashore quickly, which matters at Padar when forty other boats are doing the same thing.

For divers, Komodo is where the forty-five tanks and the dive deck earn their keep on short trips. Equipment is rental rather than included, so budget for it separately, and the national park and ranger fees are collected on top of the trip price.

Raja Ampat itineraries join in Sorong and run longer than the Komodo trips, usually a week or more, because the northern reefs around Dampier and the southern cluster at Misool are an overnight passage apart.

This is the region Nusa Kembara markets hardest, and the setup suits it: forty-five tanks means repeat dives without shuttling to a shore fill, and the camera station is a real consideration in a place where most guests are shooting. Sixteen guests is a larger group than the boutique dive boats carry, so expect to dive in waves rather than all together.

The lower deck cabins are worth thinking about here. On a seven night trip the difference between a sea-view window and a small one stops being trivial, and the price gap between cabin categories is smaller than the gap in how the room feels.

The Banda Sea crossings run in the shoulder seasons between Komodo and Raja Ampat, joining in Ambon. They are the most demanding trips on her calendar and the least frequently scheduled.

The draw is hammerheads on the seamounts, the sea snake aggregation at Manuk, and volcanic islands that see a handful of vessels a year. Ashore, Banda Neira still has the Dutch forts and the nutmeg groves that made these islands the reason Europeans came to Indonesia at all.

Passages are long and open water. A 42-metre hull handles that adequately rather than beautifully, and the party deck is less relevant than the fact that there is somewhere shaded to sit for eight hours. These are trips for divers who have done Komodo and Raja Ampat and want the harder itinerary.

Alor sits east of Flores and is the least visited of her regions. Trips join in Kalabahi. The Pantar Strait funnels cold water between the islands, which produces both the visibility and the current the area is known for.

Diving here is drift and negative entry more often than not, and the muck sites hold species Komodo simply does not have. It is not a beginner region, and with sixteen guests and a shared dive schedule it rewards people who are already comfortable in moving water.

The reason to come is as much the land as the reef. The hill villages above the coast still weave and still hold ceremonies for their own reasons rather than for visitors, which is increasingly rare this far along the tourist trail.

Halmahera is the outlier on her itinerary list and the reason Nusa Kembara is worth a second look. Very few vessels at any price run North Maluku commercially, and almost none at this rate.

Trips join in Ternate, under the volcano. The diving is a mix of walls, muck and the Widi Islands further south, and the marine life inventory reads like Raja Ampat before it was famous. Visibility is variable and infrastructure is thin, which is precisely why the reefs are in the condition they are.

Expect an expedition rather than a schedule. Departures are occasional, dates are set well ahead, and the itinerary bends around weather more than it does in Komodo. Ask early if this is the region you want.