Indonesia: Banda + Raja Ampat - Oct-Nov 2015
Dear English-speaking readers, this page is an automatic translation of an article originally written in French. I apologise for any strange sentences and funny mistakes that may have resulted. If you read French, click on the French flag below to access the original, correct text:
Français Heave high! I'm taking you back to Raja Ampat, on the most beautiful dive cruise ship, all sails out. The WaowThere is no need to say, it bears its name well...
To hoist the sails to Raja Ampat
Updated February 2018. The Waow, this magnificent cruise-diving boat that used to sail the waters of the Indonesian archipelago, and on board of which I had the chance to embark in 2015, does not exist anymore... 😢 It unfortunately burned and sank, in the bay of Cenderawasih, in Indonesia, in the night of January 31 to February 1, 2018. I refer you to the message published on their Facebook page and on their site.
November 5, 2015. I am on board of Waow for a week. After the Banda Sea, we are now sailing between the Raja Ampat islands. Luxury, calm and voluptuousness…
→ Read also : Practical information to organize your trip to Raja Ampat
In this month of November, it's not Christmas yet, but for me, it's just like... That afternoon, after the dives of the day, I run from one end to the other of the magnificent three-masted ship, my camera in hand, with the excitement of a child at the foot of the Christmas tree. Because today we hoist the sails!!!
Well, "we"... It's the guys from the crew who are doing it. First, they start by climbing everywhere, on the rigging, the bowsprit, the yards... I don't want to lose a bit of the maneuver. With my head tilted back, I watch their progress up the masts. It's high, after all... The top is more than 40m high!
It's slamming!
This time it's done. The engine's off. The three-masted ship is a real sailboat again! The wind slams the canvas, the noise is impressive. These dizzying sails unfurl and inflate, elegantly, above our heads.
Impossible to make them fit in the frame of the viewfinder of the camera. But how beautiful, how beautiful! I feel like I'm becoming a pirate princess, a great explorer of the oceans - me who loves to be on or under water, but knows little or nothing about either sailing or sailboats... 😆 (Note that I'm one of the lazy ones who, under the guise of taking pictures, just admires the efforts of the crew.)
The Waow on parade
We don't move very fast, with just the wind force to propel this huge three-masted boat of 60m. We sail peacefully, until the sun tilts its course on the horizon...
But it is soon the hour of the highlight of the show. We embark in the appendices to admire the boat of the outside. That it has of the allure, with its sails, "my" boat of princess!
Let's get loose with the cameras. Well, me, mostly... port side, starboard side. We turn around the ship to photograph it from all angles in the changing light of dusk.
A distant gray cloud suddenly turns yellow. Nature spoils us. An impromptu rainbow appears above the three-master and soon a sumptuous sunset adorns the sails with fifty shades of gold... Magnificent !!!
There is nothing more exhilarating in the world than setting sail! Literally and figuratively. The image of a sailboat on the horizon is enough to make you want to go elsewhere.
As I publish this post, I have been back in Brittany for many weeks already. And at the beginning of this year 2016, I feel again the urge to leave, to set sail again... It seems to me that I will never be satisfied with distant seas and horizons.
I was the guest of the Waow from October 27 to November 8, 2015, for this dive-cruise named "Secrets of Seram". All opinions expressed here remain 100% my own.
