Alor is the group of islands on the far eastern end of the Solor-Alor archipelago, about 65 kilometers from Timor. It consists of 15 island, the most populated being Alor Island, followed by Pantar, Pura, Ternate, Treweng, Buaya, Kangge and Kepa Island. The Alor Islands were formed by volcanic activities, and earthquakes play a substantial part – the last one was on November 2005, just two days before Kapal Selam’s trip to the islands.
The islands themselves are pristine, brown on the coasts with lush mountains in the background, fine sand beaches and crystal clear seas. Due to its many islands, liveboard trip is the best option to enjoy the underwater world of Alor Islands. Several operators are available, with various price ranges to choose from.
In the older days, Alor was said to be pelagic galore, big fishes so many beyond belief, such as barracudas, big-eyed jacks, monster groupers, dog-toothed tunas and sharks. Unfortunately, now there are only a few to be found, due to bomb-fishing and bleaching. A lot of the corals are now damaged, but in our trip we managed to see a lot of sites with healthy, booming corals.
The general opinion from Kapal Selam’s liveaboard trip to Alor is that the night dives are much better than the day dives. The creatures are much more abundant during the night dives compared to the day ones. However, there are some magnificent sites that are definitely worth a visit during the day, such as Kal’s Dream, The Arch and the No Name site where we spotted Mandarin fish. A good percentage of the dive sites in Alor have strong currents that are undoubtedly not for the faint-hearted (or beginners).