Buried Treasures: An ocean of legends
The Indian Ocean has always been a place of mystery and adventure. For centuries, its islands served as waypoints, hideouts and staging posts for some of the most colorful and ruthless figures in maritime history: the pirates and privateers who terrorized merchant shipping across the trade routes between Europe, Arabia, India and the East. And where there were pirates, there was plunder. Great quantities of it, according to the legends that have accumulated over the centuries. Some of those riches, it is said, were never recovered.
The idea that immense wealth might still lie hidden beneath the sands and granite boulders of these beautiful islands adds a layer of romantic intrigue to an already extraordinary part of the world. And the legends, it turns out, have more basis in historical fact than you might expect.
The buried treasures of Oliver Levasseur
Of all the pirate legends associated with the Indian Ocean, none is more compelling than the story of Olivier Levasseur, known as La Buse or The Buzzard. A French pirate active in the early eighteenth century, Levasseur is said to have seized one of the richest prizes in piracy history: the Portuguese warship Nossa Senhora do Cabo, captured off the coast of Réunion in 1721. The ship’s cargo was staggering, gold, silver, diamonds, jewels and religious artifacts, including a golden cross of extraordinary size. Eventually captured and hanged for his crimes, at his execution in Réunion in 1730, Levasseur reportedly threw a cryptogram into the crowd and shouted that his buried treasures was there for whoever could find it. To this day, no one has. The encoded message still exists, and the treasure, estimated to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars in today’s terms, is believed by many to be hidden on Mahé, the main island of Seychelles.
Captain Kidd and the Indian Ocean trail
William Kidd, better known as Captain Kidd, is one of history’s most famous privateers, a man commissioned by the British Crown to suppress piracy who ended up being hanged for it in London in 1701. Before his capture, Kidd sailed extensively through the Indian Ocean and there is a persistent rumor that his immense riches were stashed somewhere along his Indian Ocean route. Madagascar, where Kidd sheltered and where a thriving pirate colony once existed at Ile Sainte-Marie, is among the locations that have attracted the most determined buried treasures hunters.
Hidden gems: the islands themselves
Of course, the greatest buried treasures of the Indian Ocean do not require a secret pirate map to find. They simply require knowing where to look, which is where Private Ocean Islands comes in.
For example, Rodrigues, the outer island of Mauritius, remains one of the Indian Ocean’s best-kept secrets. Rugged, unhurried and ringed by one of the largest lagoons in the region, it offers a glimpse of island life largely untouched by mass tourism, along with excellent fly-fishing, spectacular diving, and a warmth of welcome that the bigger resorts struggle to match.
The outer atolls of the Seychelles, including Alphonse Island and Cosmoledo, are equally extraordinary and well worth the journey. Here, the shallow turquoise flats are alive with bonefish and giant trevally, the reefs are pristine, and the sense of having arrived somewhere genuinely remote and unspoiled is palpable.
In the Maldives, too, there are islands and atolls that most visitors never reach, offering private villa experiences and untouched marine environments far beyond the well-trodden resort strips of the central atolls.
Your own discovery awaits
The Indian Ocean has been drawing dreamers, adventurers and wanderers for centuries. Today, its islands offer something rarer still: genuine seclusion, extraordinary natural beauty, and the kind of luxury that feels completely at home in a barefoot, sun-drenched setting.
Whether the idea of pirate legends adds a frisson of romance to your island escape, or you simply want to find your own hidden gem in this most beautiful of oceans, contact the specialists at Private Ocean Islands today and let us help you discover your perfect Indian Ocean retreat.