Shared departures from $250 per person per night. Solo travelers, couples and small groups join fixed itineraries on premium vessels — meet fellow travelers, split costs, lock in dates.
An Open Trip is a shared liveaboard departure on a fixed itinerary and fixed dates. Instead of chartering an entire vessel, you book a single cabin — or a single bed — and share the boat with six to fourteen other travellers from around the world. The boat is identical, the crew is identical, the safety equipment and the route through the national park are identical to a private charter; the only thing that changes is the price, because the running cost of the voyage is split across a full manifest rather than carried by one group.
Departures run regularly from April through November in 2D1N, 3D2N and 4D3N formats, so you can match the trip to the time you have. Cabins are usually twin-share, with a limited number of private and en-suite upgrades that sell out first. Open trips suit solo travellers, backpackers, couples watching a budget, and anyone who actively enjoys the social side of travel — the friendships that form over four days of snorkelling, trekking and deck dinners with strangers from twenty different countries are, for many guests, the best souvenir of the trip.
Pricing starts from $250/person/night for a shared cabin with shared bathroom on a standard phinisi, rising to around $500/person/night for an en-suite cabin on a premium phinisi. Every fare is all-inclusive: three meals a day plus snacks, drinking water, snorkel gear, an English-speaking guide on every land excursion, all Komodo National Park and ranger fees, and complimentary airport transfer.
The thing nobody tells you about an open trip is how quickly the boat stops feeling like a shared vessel and starts feeling like yours. By the first sunset — somewhere between the welcome drink and the first dinner on deck — the solo travellers, the couples and the small groups have folded into a single, easy crew of their own. People swap snorkel tips, lend reef-shoes, share dive footage, and conspire about who is brave enough to climb Padar before dawn. For solo travellers especially, an open trip is the rare adventure that is genuinely better for not doing it alone.
And you give up nothing of the destination. You still hike with rangers among the dragons, still drift over manta cleaning-stations, still wake at anchor in bays the day-boats can’t reach. The itinerary is the same headline experience the private charters pay multiples for — you simply arrive at it shoulder to shoulder with a deck full of people who, by the time the boat returns to Labuan Bajo, you’ll be exchanging numbers with.
Check live departure dates and lock in your seat — popular dates sell out 4-6 weeks ahead during peak season.
