Jofiel

A local hull, built around seven guests

Jofiel was laid down and finished right here in Labuan Bajo in 2017, out of ironwood. It has never sailed in from somewhere else, and every season since has run through the same waters it was built beside.

Every charter on Jofiel books the whole boat, never a cabin inside it. Cap the guest count at seven and the crew at six, and the ratio comes out close to one crew member per guest. There’s no shared schedule to fit around and no itinerary set by strangers: the days, the route and the pace on board belong to whoever books it.

Three cabins, four bathrooms, one balcony

The Master Cabin takes the upper deck and opens onto its own private balcony. Below, the Double Cabin and the Triple Cabin share the lower deck, and across all three the boat runs four bathrooms, one more than the cabin count needs, so a full charter of seven is never waiting on a shower.

A compressor on board, and everything else looked after

Diving on Jofiel runs on its own gear rather than a bolt-on. It carries its own Bauer breathing-air compressor, DIN and Yoke valve tanks, and a tender kept for diving days alone, so the setup for a dive is already on deck rather than picked up in town.

Jofiel runs on Starlink, a satellite connection that keeps working well past where the old signal usually gives out. Housekeeping runs daily, an onboard bar keeps drinks and snacks stocked, and there’s an audio and video setup for the evenings nobody feels like talking. None of it is why you’d charter a three-cabin boat, but it’s why a week on board doesn’t feel like camping.