Komodo graduation trip on one phinisi

Nobody reschedules a graduation. That makes the date the one fixed point in the plan, and a whole-boat charter is not tied to the Monday and Friday calendar of the open trip. The boat's own calendar decides, so send the days after your last exam or ceremony and ask us whether it is free on them.

Months differ in sea and crowds. From April to June and again from October to November the seas are calm and visibility is high. July and August bring the strongest wind of the dry season and the busiest anchorages, and late December is wet and busy with holiday travellers. If your window falls in July or August, say so when you ask for the quote.

The deposit of 50% holds the date. The quote prices your head count, so settle who is coming before the deposit goes out. Names come later.

One price covers the whole group, so the cost per person depends only on how many of you come. The group charter rates page prints the grid: find the column for your length of trip and the row for your head count.

On a 3D2N charter, 12 friends pay IDR 6,330,000 (≈ USD 388) each, 16 pay IDR 5,220,000 (≈ USD 320) and 20 pay IDR 4,180,000 (≈ USD 256). On a 2D1N charter, 16 pay IDR 4,670,000 (≈ USD 287) each. Three lines are not in those figures. The first is the park ticket, which each graduate buys online in their own name: IDR 250,000 a day for a foreign guest, IDR 50,000 a day for an Indonesian guest. Rangers are extra, as the park-fees page explains. The other two lines are a guide and photographs, which a charter does not include. Add them to the group budget now.

Budget the flight and a hotel night before departure as well. Land in Labuan Bajo a day early. The return time of a private charter is fixed in the confirmation, so book flights home after you have it.

Below 15 guests the open trip costs less per head than the whole boat, because each person pays only the cabin fare and does not carry a share of an empty boat.

Pick one organiser and keep that person's job small. They sign the booking, send the deposit of 50% and receive the one invoice. Everyone else pays the organiser.

Write the payment rules in the group chat before the first transfer: the amount, the date, the account, and what happens to someone who leaves. A friend who withdraws leaves a share of the boat unpaid, and the organiser carries it unless the group agreed otherwise. The booking terms refund 50% at 60 days or more and 25% from 30 to 59 days, and nothing inside 30 days.

• Collect each guest's boat share before the balance date, which falls 30 days before departure.
• Ask each guest to buy their own park ticket online, in their own name.
• Collect passport details with the money, because the list reaches us with the balance.
• Keep a short sheet of who has paid what.

Send any diet needs together with the head count. We print no halal, vegan or allergy guarantee for this boat.

Seven cabins hold 21 friends in fixed berths, three to a cabin. At 14 or fewer, nobody has to share a bed. From 15, two friends share a double, and on a graduation trip that is a decision worth taking in the open: couples together, close friends together, and nobody paired who has not said yes. Decide early.

Jawa and Sumbawa, the two stern cabins, have private balconies, and Jawa has a wooden bathtub outdoors on its balcony. The Flores suite has a side balcony and holds three guests at most. A group can draw lots for these three, or give them to the people who organised the trip.

If the class includes guests under 18, send their ages with the head count and decide which adult answers for each of them on board. Every cabin has its own bathroom, so nobody queues for one on the way to bed.

Guests 22 to 25 take extra beds, so a class of 25 sleeps four to a cabin in four of the cabins.

Upstairs is the party room. The sun deck is green artificial turf with around a dozen bean bags, wooden benches and two floodlights on the mast. Karaoke and a sound system come with the private charter. There is no shade on the turf, so a daytime session needs hats and a water bottle in the hand.

Every guest goes home with a woven ikat cloth, a keepsake that the boat's printed list includes in the fare. One cloth per graduate. Nobody has to organise it.

No rule on alcohol is printed for this boat, so ask us before you plan a toast. Plan the evening around what the boat has, not around what a venue on land would have. Send your date and head count, and we return a programme and a quote. The stops are on the 3-day 2-night route page.