Labengki & Sombori 5D4N: Full Island Circuit

Five days is enough to stop rushing. It adds Mbokita village, the Five Lagoons and the Jellyfish Lagoon, and leaves room for weather.

The shorter trips are a highlights reel. This one has slack in it, which matters here more than it does in most places, because the day plan is set by the sea. When an afternoon turns rough the guides swap the exposed stops for sheltered ones, and on a five-day trip that costs you nothing. On a three-day trip it costs you a headline sight.

The additions are worth the two extra days. Mbokita is a Bajo village built over the water and the only real settlement you visit, so it is the one part of the trip that is about people rather than scenery. The Five Lagoons are a single karst island with a cluster of separate pools inside it, best understood from above. The Jellyfish Lagoon holds stingless jellyfish in an enclosed basin, and whether they are there in numbers depends on the season, so treat it as a bonus rather than a guarantee.

Good for photographers, for anyone who dislikes being marched, and for travellers who came a long way to get to Kendari and want it to count.

Getting there

Everything starts in Kendari, the capital of Southeast Sulawesi. Haluoleo airport (KDI) takes daily flights from Makassar, and Makassar connects to Jakarta, Bali and Surabaya several times a day. We collect you in Kendari at 08:00 and drive to Tanasa Port, then it is roughly three hours by wooden boat to Labengki. Plan to arrive in Kendari the night before. Same-day connections do not work.

What the accommodation is actually like

Simple, and worth knowing in advance. Rooms are twin share with a shared bathroom, either in a homestay or in a cottage a step above it. There is no air conditioning, hot water is not guaranteed and the electricity runs on a generator that goes off overnight. Mobile signal is patchy on Labengki and mostly absent around Sombori. People who come expecting a resort are disappointed; people who come for the water are not.

A note on price

The per-person rate falls sharply as the group grows, because the boat, the guide and the fuel cost the same whether one person or six is aboard. Two people pay roughly double what six people pay each. If your dates are flexible, tell us and we will try to pair you with another small group. Cottage accommodation is available on every departure for a supplement.