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Destinations knownKomodo National Park caps daily visitors to 75 – is it finally taking conservation seriously?

After much debate over whether the park should close, the coronavirus succeeded where authorities couldn’t

As it prepares to open to domestic tourists, strict limits and a confusing booking website could be enough to keep visitors away

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Komodo dragons in Komodo National Park, in Indonesia. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 8:45am, 29 Jul 2020Updated: 8:45am, 29 Jul 2020

Remember the good old days, when tourist attractions across Asia closed for reasons other than a human-life-threatening pandemic?

First there was Boracay, in the Philippines, which shut for six months from April 2018 to sort out much needed sewage-related infrastructure. Two months later it was the turn of Thailand’s Maya Bay, where a continued hiatus from coral-damaging day trippers is yielding promising signs of environmental rehabilitation.

Then, in January 2019, Komodo National Park, in Indonesia, stepped into the spotlight, teasing a year-long closure to combat poaching of the park’s eponymous reptile inhabitants, the world’s largest extant lizard species, and their prey. Last August, after much back and forth, Indonesia’s central government and East Nusa Tenggara officials agreed that, rather than stop sightseers from visiting the “dragons” outright, their numbers would instead be limited, possibly to those who could afford a US$1,000 entry fee.

But then 2020 came along. Britain’s The Guardian newspaper notes that with entry to the park having been barred to all but the communities that inhabit it since March, “The dragons sup on venison and fish, which […] have returned in spectacular numbers to these overvisited waters.”

The view from a hiking trail on Rinca Island, in Komodo National Park. Photo: Shutterstock

But the lizards won’t be left alone for much longer. As the archipelagic nation eases into its new normal, with domestic tourism having resumed on July 31 and international arrivals expected from September 11, park authorities have introduced an online booking system for its three tourism sites: Padar, an island known for its Instagram-friendly pink beach; Loh Liang, on Komodo Island, where most large lizard encounters occur; and Loh Buaya, on the neighbouring island of Rinca, which is also home to the resplendent reptiles, as well as some spectacular hiking trails offering panoramic views across the park.