Andamans Travelogue

Why Andamans?

It had been our passion to visit an island. For a while we had been reading quite a lot of Andamans. The blue, super clean beaches and amazing flora and fauna.

How to reach here ?

By Air : direct flights from Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad ( takes about 2-3 hours)

By Ship : from Kolkata ( takes 5 days ) , Visakhapatnam ( takes 2 days), Chennai ( takes 3 days)

Places To visit in Andaman :

Port Blair : It's going to be the central location of your entire trip to Andamans. Since, it's the only entry and exit point for the A&N group of islands.

Beaches

• Collinpur : About 25 Kms from PortBlair, it's awesome, clean, picturesque must visit beach. the best past is very few visit the place to when we where there all we saw were locals so we it gave us time to enjoy the beach.
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• Wandoor Beach : Another beautiful beach in Andamans, excellent place to spend time in the evenings and watch the sunset. The kids can have some awesome fun at the beach with some sand toys. 

 

• Corbyn's Cove Beach
• Munda Pahad/Chidya Tapu Beach

Museums/Historical Interest

• Samudrika Museum
• Chatham Saw Mill
• Anthropological Museum
• Cellular Jail
• Ross Island

Water Sports

• Scuba/Snorkel/Boat - North Bay Island
• Water Scooter- Port Blair Jetty/Corbyn's Cove beach

Local Transport/logistical Help

• Gopal Bhai : An excellent local help, he has his rickshaw but helps you set up any local transport for local sight seeing, booking cruise tickets,home stays, light show or any kind of help that you need out in Andamans. He should be your go to guy. An amazing down to earth person who certainly helps setup transport at a nominal cost. (+91-95319 18600 / +91 9933202151)
• Charwa : (9474276508,9679520151) : A Local Driver and a very nice guy to take help for airport pickups and drops and visiting near by beaches/places. Super cool guy is very calm guy when it comes to waiting for you while you visit the beaches.

Hotels

• Marina Manor, Junglihaat : After a lot of diligence I picked up this hotel. I was not disappointed by them. Following are my reasons : 
• Centrally located
• Excellent and super supportive staff
• Very good/clean rooms
• The even upgraded my second stay to family suite without any charges.
• Made an advance call the night before to check my checkout time and prepared a packed breakfast since I was leaving 6:00 AM next morning. 
• They good check-in/check-out times aligning with the incoming flight timings
• The have a good restaurant to provide good food after a long day out.  

Havelock Islands - One of the best and must visit islands and perform any underwater activities. The beaches here are amazingly clean and have clear water. If the weather is good you can also do kayaking and other activities and plan to take a short trek to elephant beach that is also and experience in itself.

How to reach here :

• Cruise/Ferries -
• Makkruzz - excellent  service
• Green Ocean- Haven't tried
• A recommendation it to take a cruise to align with hotel check-in times at times arriving early won't help if not rooms are available.
• In case if the weather is windy/cyclonic it could cause
• Could cause Nausea & sea sickness
• Always keep an additional day between reaching back port blair and leaving from port Blair to avoid problems due to ferry cancellations( which can happen due to bad weather)
• Local Commute :
• Two wheelers ( recommended , if you are a couple/a family with 1 kid )
• Auto rickshaws : Biswajit (+91-9531842181/+91-8900909481  ) ( recommended if you are a small family)
• Taxis
• Beaches
• Radhanagar beach (Sunrise beach)
• Kalapatthar beach (Sunset beach)
• Elephant Beach - Water sports
• Scuba activities
• Auqa-nomad
• Scuba lov ( An outlet at the Sea shell resort) - Interestingly they do snorkel as well it came in handy as others refused and my 5 year old was adamant to do it.
• Places to live / eat
• Outback resorts - Simple but very well made resort.
• Sea Shell Resorts : One of the best beach facing properties on the island. Slightly costlier to the pocket. Good place to stay if you don't plan to step out of the resort a lot.
• Places to eat 
• Cafe Salt water : probably the best the food on the island 
• Bonova cafe : excellent food , complemented by live karaoke performance in the evenings 

Neil Island

Commute :

Car : Vadivel/Nitesh Phone Numbers ??

• Natural rock Bridge beach : a guide here is a good thing you hire. He can show you some good marine life and might as well help you click some good pictures.
• Bharathpur beach : 
• Water activities
• Laxmanpur beach 2 - Sunset beach

North Andamans

• Baratang/Diglipur - Limestone cave/Mud volcano
• Ross/Smith Island

Langot Se Kafan Tak - Dispassion

It so happened once there was a disciple, the only thing he used to wear was 'langot' rest everything he had renounced. But His Master knew, though the disciple had renounced everything he was not dispassionate. He tried every technique to make the disciple dispassionate, but without any success.

Finally the Master said, I am now sending you to the King Janaka, only He can teach you this and if He fails then no one can teach you. Listening to this disciple got frustrated and said how can a King living in luxory teach about dispassion?

But still His Master persisted and he had to go.

By evening the disciple reached the palace, as he entered the palace he saw King Janaka sitting on His golden throne, which had diamond and precious stones embedded in it. The King Janaka was being entertained by royal dancers and musicians, delicious food was being served. Looking at this scene disciple got more frustrated and said to Janaka, my Master had sent me here to learn dispassion but now I see I am in wrong place. You yourself are so deeply rooted into all these pleasures and luxury, what will you teach me? Hence I wish to take leave.

As the disciple was leaving King Janaka requested him to wait till next morning as it was already dark and it was very dangerous to travel alone in jungle. Having no choice disciple waited. That night the disciple could not eat the food as he had already renounced delicious food. He could not sleep properly because he had renounced sleeping on comfortable bed, he could only sleep on hard floor.

At the dawn King Janaka invited the disciple for bath at the royal river flowing behind His palace. The disciple kept his spare 'langot' at the palace to change after having bath. As they were having bath the disciple saw that palace was on fire and immediately yelled King your palace is on fire, your whole property is being destroyed, all your wealth is turning into ashes! How will your survive in future? Run!

King Janaka was totally unmoved as He walked toward the palace to take corrective action, looked at the disciple, smiled and said 'Hum khali Haath Aye The Aur Khali Haath Hi Jaayenge, Tum Itne Vichalit Kyun Ho Rahe Ho!' but the disciple could not wait to hear all this. He ran feverishly for his 'langot' that was kept at the palace!

That moment the disciple realized his foolishness, even after renouncing everything he lost his peace of mind just for his one 'langot' and on the other hand King Janaka being amidst of all the pleasures and luxury last night and now on verge of losing everything was unmoved, calm and peaceful; totally dispassionate!

Disciple fell at the feet’s of Janaka...

Dispassion does not mean renouncing the world, nor shunning the enjoyments of life. It simply means living in the present moment. Being free of regrets of past and worries of the future - langot se kafan tak!