All the previous posts are correct. There's more than one way to skin a cat. Here is another way to do the same thing: (just replace "what_ever_you_want_to_convert" with your string and run it in Oracle:
set serveroutput on;
DECLARE
v_str VARCHAR2(1000);
BEGIN
--Create encoded value
v_str := utl_encode.text_encode
('what_ever_you_want_to_convert','WE8ISO8859P1', UTL_ENCODE.BASE64);
dbms_output.put_line(v_str);
--Decode the value..
v_str := utl_encode.text_decode
(v_str,'WE8ISO8859P1', UTL_ENCODE.BASE64);
dbms_output.put_line(v_str);
END;
/