De Gordel van Smaragd.

    The “Gordel van Smaragd” (The Cincture of Jewels) is the evocative name coined by the author Multatuli for the former Dutch East Indies, now known as Indonesia.  Multatuli was the pen name of the author Eduard Douwes Dekker, best known for his satirical novel “Max Havelaar” exposing the abuses of colonialism in the Dutch East Indies, the country he loved. The Gordel van Smaragd is the lyrical portrayal of the Indonesian archipelago, formed by a girdle of islands of immense tropical beauty in the Java Sea.

    I was born in this country, which I left in 1950 to pursue my further studies in Europe. I have been back a few times for short periods since then to visit friends and relatives. During one of those visits, in 1990, my wife and I took a cruise from Bali to the adjacent islands, Lombok, Sumbawa, and the Komodo islands, names sounding haunting and adventurous, and names which I remember having to learn by heart in my high school years. Sumbawa is actually the western portion of the landmass called rather drily Barat (West) Nusa Tenggara.

    These places are not that accessible for the occasional tourist. There are, of course, local vessels and fishermen in the area, but not much in the form of a regular vessel or ferry for tourists.

    This brings me to Johnny, one of my boyhood friends in Indonesia. In our budding teenage years we were Boy Scouts in the same troop, actually in the same patrol. I was the patrol leader, and he was the assistant patrol leader of Eagle Patrol.  Later we went to high school together; we both went to the Netherlands for our University studies and he was the best man at our wedding in the Hague. He went back to Indonesia and over the years he became an extremely successful businessman. He owns the franchise and distribution rights of one of the top US companies for Indonesia, besides being a real estate developer of many real estate projects.

    Johnny loves to snorkel and to scuba dive, and has done so all over the world. But he believes one of the best places to snorkel and see tropical fish in their natural environment is off the Pink Beach (Pantai Merah) of a small island close to Komodo Island. In 1990 it was really not that easy to get there, unless you have your own private yacht. Nowadays, in 2014, it is still not that easy to get there, but you do have a choice of tours to get there.

    Since he had adequate financial resources at his disposal,  he decided to form a company around a boutique cruise ship, which would sail from Bali to this beach and back, and in this process visit Sumbawa and Komodo National Park. This way he would have a comfortable vessel any time he wanted to go snorkeling in Pantai Merah.

    The “Bali Sea Dancer” was moored in Bali for sale and nobody was interested in the vessel. So he bought the ship, upgraded her to modern standards, and renamed her the “Oceanic Odyssey”. She was put in service to cover this route. He ran the company for a few years, but then he sold it, I suspect because he was getting a bit tired of running this cruise-ship business. He said he lost a bit more than a  million dollars in the process, which he shrugged off when he told me the story. In 1990 that was a lot of money in Indonesia, where the average per capita income was probably less than  $200/year.

right: The “Oceanic Osyssey” moored off Komodo Island.

    The “Oceanic Odyssey” was a beautifully appointed vessel, with 60 spacious passenger cabins furnished with twin beds, writing desk, sofa, table, en-suite bathroom with shower and tub. There was also large owner’s suite somewhere one of the 5 decks of the ship. There were 75 crew members, which was very high, considering that there would be, on the average, only 100 passengers on the ship. The ship was air-conditioned throughout, was equipped with an open air swimming pool, a jacuzzi, a well-appointed gym, a sauna, hairdresser, and evening entertainment in the large lounge.

left: The ship had a nice swimming pool.

    She was  103 meters long, an NK class vessel, with a beam of 15.4 meters. Her draft was 6.2 meters, and she sported a gross tonnage of 5200 tonnes. The passengers are pampered but, at a fare of $900/per person for a three-night cruise, this was not inexpensive. But in this price, the associated land tours are also included.

    From Jakarta we took a flight to Den Pasar, the capital of the island of Bali. A representative of “Spice Island Cruises” was waiting for us at the airport and we were immediately whisked to the port of Benoa to board the “Oceanic Odyssey. A chilled bottle of wine was waiting for us in our cabin, as well as a plate of fruit and an invitation from the captain to join him for dinner. Johnny had obviously called the captain to give us special treatment.

    The ship left at 5 p.m. sharp. The route would take us north of Lombok Island in the Bali Sea in the direction of Sumbawa. Dinner was a marvelous 4-course affair, with two bottles of wine for our table courtesy of the captain.