AYANA Komodo Resort Hotel Review, Labuan Bajo, Indonesia

All-day restaurant Rinca serves a delectable breakfast buffet with food from Indonesia (nasi goreng and an excellent soto ayam soup), the West and China (fried chicken with sweet soy sauce). Strangely, there were no standard buffet eggs when I was there, even though American-style bacon, hash browns and grilled tomatoes were on offer.

For dinner, Rinca’s local fish head soup with lime leaf and lemongrass was one of the tastiest dishes of my extensive Indonesia visit. Sublime, too, were the morsels served – at times ‘tossed’ – in my entertaining teppanyaki lunch at Honzen, the resort’s upscale Japanese restaurant. Beachfront Kisik Grill hosts a ‘market’ service where diners handpick the fresh catch of the day, from spiny lobster to barracuda.

Disappointingly, Unique Rooftop Bar’s magnificent views and décor were marred by soundtracks of corny pop music remakes, a watery whisky sour order (the local, arak-based Mai Cee Ite Bo was an excellent replacement) and spotty service.