Planning a trip to Alor for your next underwater adventure? You’ll have to do a little legwork to get to this small island in eastern Indonesia, but it will be worth every moment. For more snorkeling in Alor and the island’s underwater marvels, you can read more here. But to pack your bags, get to the island, and settle in, read on.

Getting to Alor, Indonesia

As with many islands in Indonesia, Alor is far off the beaten path.

If you want to tell people where you’re going, you might try, “just north of Timor-Leste,” or “a little bit southeast of Sulawesi,” but you may still be met with blank stares. All of this should tell you that getting there is not going to be easy.

Your first legs will depend on where you’re starting out. For me, that was Singapore. For flights, I was instructed as follows:

• Purchase a ticket to Jakarta. No problem.
• Fly to Kupang, on the island of Timor. Easy, but only if you don’t mind sleep deprivation.
• Fly to Alor.

Once in Alor, the resort picked me up and whisked me away for a 45-minute ride along roads that were mostly paved, then extremely bumpy at the end.

A Few Extra Complications

On paper, that all looked relatively easy. But I discovered several twists along the way:

1. I needed to be in Kupang in time to make the Alor flight at 8:30 a.m. This meant that I had to take a redeye from Jakarta to Kupang, leaving at 2:00 a.m. and arriving at 6:15 a.m. I’m pretty sure I got about three hours of sleep that night.
2. Flight times did not allow me to return via Jakarta — I had to fly back from Kupang to Bali instead. This meant that I needed to book a bunch of separately ticketed legs rather than round-trip fares.
3. The domestic flights in Indonesia could only be purchased with a local credit card. With a foreign credit card, you have to go through a travel agent.
4. Domestic carriers in Indonesia are confusing. I bought flights on Wings Air, Batik Air, and Lion Air to make all of this happen — and in the end, I found myself on a Super Air Jet plane (which said “Say No to Drugs. Say Yes to Travel.” on the side).

I booked the flights myself, so I was able to choose my own connecting flights, though the resort recommended a travel service. Also, it’s worth noting that I did not check luggage, so I didn’t have to worry about my bags making it through all of this. And while I was worried about my carry-on getting wet on the tarmac in Kupang, they kindly provided us with umbrellas!

On your first day at the resort, you’re likely to find yourself complaining loudly to the other guests about how tired you feel. But that will soon be behind you.

Staying at Alami Alor

Choosing a place to stay can have its hurdles. The good news is that in Alor, you don’t have all that many options — when I was looking, there were only about twenty lodging choices, including resorts, hotels, and homestays. That made it easy to narrow things down, especially since I knew I wanted air conditioning, diving and snorkeling facilities, three meals a day, and a house reef.

I’ll admit that I did relatively little research, because I was sold on Alami Alor from the start. I’m a sucker for a beautiful website. The blogs I read had only good things to say. Of course, you always wonder whether a place will measure up to a shiny web presence and glowing reviews. But Alami Alor succeeded on just about every front.

Alami Alor bills itself as a “boutique dive and snorkel resort” that caters to only a handful of guests at a time. During our one-week stay, we had no more than ten people around the communal dining table at any given time, so the resort always felt cozy and intimate.

Everyone ate together at that long table, choosing their own breakfasts from a menu and then sharing a wide array of dishes for both lunch and dinner.

The food was consistently delicious and plentiful (if someone would let me go back just for the breakfast breads and beef rendang, I might be willing to suffer those flights all over again). As for the communal table, that’s always a bit of a crapshoot, but we had a great time and made new friends. The resort managers kept the conversations flowing expertly and had us laughing every night.

Villa Time

Our villa surprised us — it was so big that we could have fit an extra person. Aside from that, it was simple and clean (and if you look in the upper left-hand corner, you’ll see the very important AC unit).

Each of the seven villas at Alami Alor comes with a view out over the water …

… and an outdoor shower with plenty of hot water.

We spent our time in our villa reading and looking out the window for whales, which sometimes pass by between June and November. For Wi-Fi and hot tea, as well as a comfy place to play cribbage, we headed to the large common area (there’s no Wi-Fi in the villas).

Diving & Snorkeling at Alami Alor

You’re probably coming to Alor to check out the underwater scene, and you’ll find it a magical place (take a look at my post on the Alor experience for reef and critter pics).

The dive and snorkel guides know their stuff and will take good care of your gear. The boats are cozy, no boat trip is very long, and group sizes are purposefully small. You’ll head out every morning for two dives or snorkels and be back at the resort by a reasonable lunchtime. Thankfully, you’ll have very little work or carrying to do — these lovely humans really take care of the Alami Alor guests.

I completed my Nitrox certification while I was there, and while that course does not have a particularly rigorous reputation, my instructor took my training seriously. Our nightly briefings were thorough, and snorkelers and divers received separate plans and information. If you’re a snorkeler, this is the place for you — snorkeling is treated very much as its own activity, and they even have a dedicated snorkel guide.

We took advantage of our snorkel and dive packages, plus muck and night snorkeling add-ons. While we had brought our own masks and fins, we gladly took advantage of the resort’s wetsuit and torch rentals for the night snorkeling excursions (the water in Alor can get chilly). The resort has a full suite of gear for rent for any guest who might need it. And divers, you’ll find a camera room if you’re traveling with serious equipment.

As a bonus, after we arrived home, we received an email with a logbook to record our trip. It was a really nice touch.

How long should you stay in Alor?

We stayed in Alor for seven nights, which felt perfect. If you’re looking to stay at Alami Alor, I’m not sure they offer stays for less than six nights (when they quoted me dates, that was the shortest available stay they offered). But I wouldn’t want less than that anyway — if you’re going to travel this far, you’ll want to soak up the experience once you arrive.

The House Reef at Alami Alor

I chose Alami Alor because its house reef came highly advertised. If there was one place where the resort let me down, it was here. I know that’s not the resort’s fault — water conditions can change, and perhaps the house reef really has spectacular moments. But when we visited, the water was consistently greenish and hazy.

That said, we did have a spectacular night snorkel at the house reef, complete with a huge octopus, cuttlefish, resident mandarinfish, enormous eels, and moray eggs floating around us in the water. And I hopped into the house reef every morning straight from the jetty just to check it out. So I can say with confidence that on a clear-water day, the reef has potential.

Planning a Trip to Alor: The Packing Part

I’m not going to provide an exhaustive packing list here, since so many packing lists already exist for snorkelers and scuba divers (though if you want a master class in packing your whole world in just a carry-on, with room for a mask and fins, check out my round-the-world packing post). But I do want to highlight a few essentials that you might want to bring.

• Snacks, especially if you like sweet things. The resort will provide you with chips and nuts in the late afternoon, but if you crave a cookie by the pool or a small bite of chocolate before bed, you’re on your own.
• A robust medical kit. The resort has first aid kits, but between a sinus infection and a toe infection, my sister and I were happy that we had a well-stocked supply of NyQuil and Band-Aids.
• Dive/snorkel mask, rash guard, and leggings. The resort rents masks, but if there’s one thing I always recommend having in your snorkel or dive bag, it’s a mask that fits you well. As for the rash guard and leggings, Alor’s water can be chilly — I was happy to be well covered.
• Cash for tips.
• Books and/or games. You’ll have plenty of downtime in the afternoons — though you may just want to spend it looking out over the ocean from your lounge chairs.

As you’ll see from the picture above, this is a rocky shoreline, so you can leave your beach toys at home.

Alor Planning: Things I Wish I’d Known

I feel like I did precious little research on Alor before I struck out for the airport, and I’m actually glad about that. It was fun to be surprised by whales and long (albeit unsuccessful) waits for mola mola to appear. But I do think there are two things I should have learned before booking the trip:

• Alor is famous for its significant and unpredictable currents. If you’re a diver, I would not pick this spot as a beginner.
• The water was colder than I’d expected! Check the water temps beforehand, know your body, and pack accordingly.

Other than that, I expected an amazing underwater experience, and I was not disappointed. My sister and I are already talking about going again!