Roon Island

Roon Island is located in the north of the Wandamen Peninsula and is part of the North Wasior District. Roon Island, if interpreted in Indonesian is an island where ironwood has gromth. A few years ago, according to the story of the Roon people, this place was filled with ironwood trees, but along with the clearing of villages and land, and economic needs increase, the number of ironwood trees on the island is decreasing. Now Roon Island has become a district consisting of 7 villages, including Yende, Mena, Syabes, Indai, Niap, Sariay, and Menarbu villages. Local wisdom and church history have been part of the life of the Roon community for generations.

On this island, there is Yende Village with its unique residents' housing that is above the water. There is also an old church that has the Bible published in 1898. Some tourist activities that the visitors can enjoyed in this area include: diving, snorkeling, enjoying the underwater world, enjoying waterfalls and observing animals, especially birds.

Every year there will be a tourism festival on Roon Island. Resort buildings made from local materials to extraordinary stages are neatly arranged on Wasasar beach. People from 7 villages around Roon Island compete to make a beautiful touch of the festival location. One by one they weave sago leaves into for the roof and walls of the house, weaving wood with rattan ropes arranging every corner with ornamental plants that can make visitors stay a long in this place. Not only Wasawar Beach, the people of Kampung Niap, which is one of the villages designated as lodging locations for guests, has also been polished to become a comfortable inn for guests to live in.

The festival event started with the Roon people's remorse dance for a missionary named Godlief Lodwyk Bink (also known as GL Bink) who came to bring "Light" to the people of Roon Island, displaying traces of Christian evangelism for the people of Roon Island. Local wisdom in customary marriage of children, conflict and customary justice as well as ancestral beliefs in a place that considered sacred to the manufacture of traditional musical instrument, the flute tambour, which has long been used to accompany spiritual praises for the Roon people during worship.

The series of festival events closed with a music concert from Om Sandy Betay, a Papuan singer who is very much liked by Roon people because he is also from Roon Island. The tired was lost for a moment when sung beautiful memorial songs. It's like an expression of people's hearts about life as it is on Roon Island, that's the content of the Roon Island festival. A phrase that indicates the life needs to be appreciated because nature has provided everything for us humans, all that needed is to respect it and keep it alive and available to meet its human needs in the future.

How to get there?
Roon Island can be reached by longboat from Wasior with travel time between 1.5 – 2 hours. For visitors who want to stay overnight, this island has several simple tourist inns.