The Flores Sea is full of tons of small islands, many with idyllic crystal clear turquoise water beaches. One wants to say "idyllic white sand beaches" but that's not the case. There is so much red coral broken up in the sand, that it makes the sand look pink! The pink sand, in contrast with the color of the sea, is something uniquely beautiful.
Pink Beach
Our boat pulled up near Pink Beach and we all jumped off into the water. It was quite chilly! There weren't tons of fish but I did see some parrots, moorish idols, triggers, and even a few sea turtles! :) The sea floor was absolutely carpeted with beautiful soft corals and anemones; possibly the most live soft corals and anemones I've ever seen in one place. You can swim to the beach to relax and have a close look at the pink sand. There was only one other small group on the beach when we were there.So yeah, there's a beer boat! A wonderful entrepreneur paddles up to the tour boat and sells "cool beer" (large Bintangs) for Rp 50,000 each.
Crystal Beach
The next day we skipped the scheduled Kanawa beach which is only 1 hour from Labuan Bajo and is very crowded with loads of boats. Instead, we went to Crystal Beach. OMG it's about as good as it gets. Perfect clear water, a little chilly, and lots of tropical fishies. More like 1000s of many varieties of damsel fish. Nothing short of magical and it was much more pink than Pink Beach. :) Happy moment.Little Caribbean
Then to top it all off, we went to Little Caribbean right by Manta Point. Now at the end of the tour, I was pretty exhausted (hiked Padar in the morning and just finished swimming with the mantas) but it was worth one more swim against the strong currents to walk on this little gem.It's a small patch of (pink) sand in a swath of light turquoise sea against a baby blue sky.