I'm sat in a cute little restaurant/cafe/bar called 'the Lounge' (v v trendy for Indonesia) on the island of Flores and devouring a pot of peppermint tea. What a treat, it must have been about two months since my last cup of this delectable nectar and I've had some serious withdrawal symptoms. Drinking black tea is simply not quite up to par, particularly when it's doused with a huge helping of sugar, Indonesian style.

Well where to start, Flores has been rather action packed and incredibly sedentary almost simultaneously. We arrived in Maumere on another little propeller jet and for the perhaps the first time since Africa I was the one surrounded by touts and tourist hunters at the exit. James stole my strategy of hanging around a few paces behind and I can't believe it worked for him too. After a minor disaster deciding to stay on the east of Maumere, we soon backtracked as it was a bit of a dump. Back in Maumere we were dropped at a little beachside place recommended to us by a guide at the airport some three hours before, if only we'd listened.Maumere is hot hot hot, purely in the temperature sense. Soaring to heights of 37-40 degrees and we were roasting.

Bored of incredibly long bus journeys in obscene temperatures we treated ourselves to a driver and a guide on a trip across the island from East to West, what a perfect decision that turned out to be. Our guide Teddy and driver Yopi showed us the sights of Flores for the next five days and we were not disappointed. The roads here are like a board of snakes and ladders but with more twists and turns so getting anywhere takes rather a long time but our first day was punctuated with stops at a villages and sights along the way. A group of women presented us with their wares, namely some beautiful Ikat weaving. The labour and skill that goes into making this intricately detailed cloth is simply mind boggling. The village we visited is one of a few that continue to use traditional methods, from hand spinning the cotton, making natural dyes, tying cloth in incredible patterns all before beginning the process of weaving. For you non crafters our there this may sound a little too labour intensive but I am pleased to have purchased myself a little bit of art and culture combined. My one 'blanket' took a year to produce.

Later stops included stunning beaches, crazy stones in blue and green that are shipped to china to make ceramic and all this before our trip up a volcano. One of our main reasons for coming to Flores was to visit Kelimutu, a rather large volcano with three coloured crater lakes. We were up early to get to the summit before sunrise and the views were rather spectacular. The lakes are beautiful but deadly, one is 47 degrees and highly acidic. Apparently if you fall in there you'll be dissolved in a couple of hours - what a nice way to go! A few more hours in the car, named honeybunny by the way, and we arrived in Bajawa. We visited an incredible traditional village that looked like something out of a film set, the local villagers exist under a matrilineal system and the women chew betel nut like it's going out of fashion.Another volcano called the next day with more crater lakes and later some incredibly toasty hot springs where the water was literally bubbling out of the ground at scorching bath water temperatures.

The scenery here in Flores is quite simply stunning, they have 12 active volcanoes on this island and one named big papa, shaped like a huge chunk of toblerone is still smoking, a wonderful sight. All that volcanicity makes the land rather fertile and they grow everything from coffee, vanilla, cloves, and cinnamon alongside the usual suspects.

Now animal lovers our there might want to skip the next couple of paragraphs. During our first dinner with Teddy and Yopi we were chatting about food and asked if there are any particular delicacies in Flores we should try, Teddy replied yes but that it was disgusting. Probing a little further we discovered actually it wasn't disgusting in taste but most foreigners can't stomach it. Ok so its dog and we were blatantly going to have to try it. It seems that any dog will do but male is best as it's better for giving 'energy'! Our last supper consisted of pork satay, dog, rice and Arak (local palm spirit) mixed with honey and lime. Delicious, all apart from the dog! The taste actually wasn't that bad but the bowl plonked down in front of us came complete with bone, gristle and huge chunks of black skin. We should have realised we weren't going to get a nice bbq joint to chomp on. So a few mouthfuls tried and not to be repeated. We had a little chat about cat too but apparently they haven't tried that!

The trip ended in Labuan Bajo where we said our goodbyes to Teddy and Yopi after a great five days. Here we've spent the last two nights overlooking the bay with the islands of Rinca and Komodo just across the water. James has been diving and is out there at the moment hoping to spot Manta Rays, the last on his list of must see's. Unfortunately a little walking mishap has prevented me from going out on the boat to snorkel with the manta's, nothing to worry about just a sliced knee and that medical kit has finally been used!

Tonight we board a boat which will take us to Lombok stopping a couple of times along the way, another two nights on the deck of a boat but this time I think we'll have some company. We're both rather excited as we stop at Rinca tomorrow, home of the Kimodo dragon. These fearsome looking dinasouresque iguana type creatures are pretty ferocious. Let's hope I can hobble around quick enough!