Luxury Cruising: The Europa 2 From Sydney to Bali And The Lure Of Days At Sea

Is it the journey or the destination?

The getting there or the being there that counts?

This question has long been a litmus test of one’s travel psyche, and for years the judgment has been that the person who journeys is the real traveler.

THD once counted himself among them, but over the past 35 years he has gone over to the other side because now the journey has become so standardized. The Orient Express had romance; the TGV and its counterparts offer speed. Business and first class cabins provide a shield from the travail of airports and the chaos of economy, and on international flights, the prospect of sleep. Do they have the glamour of the Pan Am Clippers? No, but that’s okay. THD will trade 10 journey anecdotes for the pleasure of getting to lunch in Paris or Rome in good shape.

The Europa 2 at sea

Hapag-Lloyd Cruise Lines

But there’s still one exception: A blue-water cruise, meaning one that has as many or more days at sea than in port, such as the one THD just took from Sydney to Bali: Six days at sea, including four in a row between Lizard Island, Australia, and Komodo Island, Indonesia, and five port days. If being at sea really appeals to you, here’s a cruise for you (EUX 1911, June 8-19) from Colombo, Sri Lanka to Limassol, Cyprus, an itinerary with eight sea days in a row (and a Suez Canal transit).

The point of such cruises is the Prozac effect of the ocean–the Europa 2 often goes out of its way to avoid seas that would break the spell–and the hours of time to dispose of as you please. That’s especially true when sailing east, as every other day or so, one gains an hour. (These are Kindle cruises, you might say.) Blue water cruises also often get you to far-flung places effortlessly, Komodo Island on my cruise, for example, to see the Komodo Dragon, the world’s largest reptile and found only here in the wild.

Sydney-Bali was a nice compromise itinerary between sea and shore days. The evening departure from Sydney took us right past the Opera House, Champagne flutes in hand ready for a toast. Brisbane offered the opportunity to visit the world’s largest Koala Bear sanctuary. The approach to Hamilton Island took us past dozens of the Whitsunday Islands (there are 74 in all) on a morning of dramatic light and cloud, and Lizard Island, a granite outcrop near the top of the Barrier Reef, basked under a perfect sky. In the succeeding four days at sea, the sky changed its mood hourly.

Life doesn’t usually offer such curtain-raisers daily.

There was a palpable drop in the ship’s heart rate each time we departed and the next day was at sea. On a trans-Atlantic Europa 2 cruise two years ago, Captain Ulf Wolter, also in command of this cruise, made an announcement one morning: “There are no ships near us, no whales, no schools of dolphins, not even sea birds.” On this cruise, we’re not that far offshore, but the feeling is similar.

Of course, you’re as connected as you want to be to the world, courtesy of the ship’s satellite Internet. Still, there’s something cord-cutting about the experience: Brexit, Trump tweets, North Korea, trade disputes–out here they seemed like trace radio signals from deep space. My big challenge each morning was to decide which restaurant to book for dinner that evening.