Collection: Komodo
I did not plan to dive Komodo. I knew almost nothing about it. Then a friend rang to say someone had dropped out and the spot was going at half price, and I said yes before really thinking about it.
It turned out to be one of those trips that rearranges your expectations. I had read about the dragons — everyone has — but nobody had told me what was underneath. Manta rays, enormous and completely unbothered. Corals in colours I had not seen elsewhere. Nudibranchs everywhere, if you slowed down enough to look. And the water itself is a particular shade there, something I still cannot name properly but recognise instantly in photographs.
The drift dives were otherworldly. You do not swim in Komodo so much as get carried, and the trick is to stop fighting it and let the current show you the reef at its own speed. Above water the hiking was just as good, and the sunsets were the kind that make everyone on the boat go quiet.
This design came out of a trip I nearly did not take. That is most of what I want it to say: the best diving of my life came from a phone call I could easily have let go to voicemail.
