In Reply to: Fabulous JBR posted by karrie on Tuesday, 18. October 2005 at 06:52 Bali Time:
Hi Karrie,
No we never felt unsafe at all - the group of us from the Perama boat were walked around part of the island with two or three local guides. The dragons were huge but I think they are used to people walking around - we went quite close up to them to take photos. They really look like something prehistoric. The guides did tell us a story about a German man many years ago who wanted to break away from the group to find the dragons himself - apparently they just found his camera and sunglasses!! Not aure if this is a bit of a myth they tell everyone though...
I would definitely recommend doing a boat trip to see the Komodo dragons like this - it was rough, but it was definitely worth it. Also, my dad did the same trip but did the return trip too, and he said the way back wasn't rough at all. I have heard several other people say the same thing. Also, on the way back you stop at Rinca Island, where you see many more dragons and other wildlife too.
If you do go all that way, it is lovely to just see the dragons of course, but I would definitely recommend keeping at least a few days spare to stop in Flores. It was one of my favourite places of my trip.