Onassis love boat on sale for a cool R318m
A YACHT is never just a yacht. For Aristotle Onassis, the Christina was a palace of seduction, a place to broker deals, a celebrity honeytrap and the most conspicuous symbol of his successful shipping empire.
On a visit with Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton acknowledged in one sentence both the generosity of his host and his blatant self-indulgence. “I don’t think there is a man or woman on earth,” he said, “who would not be seduced by the pure narcissism shamelessly flaunted on this boat.”
Onassis, who would deploy his wolfish charm on Maria Callas, Jacqueline Kennedy and countless other women there, saw no edge in the remark. “I have found that to be so,” he replied.
Every big boat owner, struck by the romance of the sea and his rightful place upon it, likes to think he has created a legend. Onassis, the Greek shipping magnate, truly did. The opulent Christina, a decommissioned warship that he bought for scrap in 1954 and spent £4-million converting, became a floating Xanadu to some of the most important figures of the 20th century. The boat is up for sale again — asking price £21-million (about R318-million).
In 1968 Onassis married President John F Kennedy’s widow, Jackie, on board, close to his private island of Skorpios — the ultimate trophy wife on the ultimate trophy ship. Monaco’s Prince Rainier and his film star wife, Grace Kelly, were favoured guests.
Egypt’s dethroned King Farouk called the yacht “the last word in opulence”. Winston Churchill, in a white Panama hat and cruising suit, was aboard for eight cruises between 1958 and 1965.
Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, Greta Garbo, Liza Minnelli, Eva Peron, John Wayne, Rudolf Nureyev and a fistful of Rothschilds and Rockefellers all swept down the onyx and silver staircase, swam in a marble pool that rose at the touch of a button to become a dance floor and sat at a bar — Ari’s Bar — on stools upholstered with the foreskin of a minke whale. There was a Renoir, a De Chirico and two fake Goyas that Onassis enjoyed letting his guests think were real.
The bar stools allowed Onassis to indulge regularly in one of his poor jokes. “Madame,” he would say to female guests, “you are sitting on the largest penis in the world.”
Onassis was not subtle. The man who became a friend of prime ministers felt no need to be.
Since he died in 1975, the Christina, named after his daughter, has had more facelifts than an ageing Hollywood star, but it has seldom been out of the news. It is moored on the Medway in Kent in the UK for yet another refurbishment before the sale takes place.