After a short flight and an even shorter taxi ride I finally arrived in Port Blair, the main gateway to the Andaman islands, more than a thousand kilometers off the coast from mainland India just 150 km close to Burma (Myanmar) India does it’s best to support the locals, lots of Bengalis who were relocated some decades ago to claim the islands for the subcontinent being a strategical outpost, politically and of course for military reasons. Although people from all over India can be found here, mostly working in tourist industry but still some indigenous tribes living in remote spots with almost zero contact to the modern world, most of them are almost extinct though, just the Nicobari tribe seems to survive as they adapted a bit to the outside world. The Andamans are actually some 600 islands most of them are uninhabited and also off limits for tourists. The close by Nicobar islands can just been entered by special permit, even for Indians, foreigners just get a chance to stay in a handful of the islands – for maximum 45 days. I’ll stay for a month and master the art of minimalism, one might call it also relaxing in paradise 🙂
Port Blair is a busy port town, it feels Indian and I book a ferry the next day and have a stroll around the war memorial beach with a lookout of Ross island the former British headquarters – all devastated by the 2004 boxing day tsunami which also hit the islands, some more hard than others though…I also checked out the cellular jail, now being a national monument of the country but back in the days it was the hardest prison for political dissidents built by the Brits. Torture and cruelty were every days life 120 years ago and the energies were still disturbed, a negative place, I could not spend much time near the cells and wanted to catch my ferry anyway, which took me to Havelock island – for many people this is Andaman, white sandy beaches, lots of nature, palms, ancient forests, lovely temperatures around the 30’s, emerald blue waters with temperatures around 28°C and also a diving paradise!
The island is big enough to get lost the first time and takes a while to explore by bike and I did the first days before my dive course started.
I explored the beach around the place where I stayed a bit, when the tides are low you can walk out the sea bed for a couple hundreds of meters – there is still so much life to spot near the sand and rocks – what a nice exploration!
Voted Asia’s most beautiful beach some years ago – Radhanagar beach or simply beach no. 7 has no doubt earned this title for real, the best white sand I’ve ever seen, the finest grain ever, it just feels so soft to walk, the waters calm and warm, on each side of the long beach a nice reef with vibrant life to spot, in the backdrop an ancient forest, so good! When I was walking I felt like Alice in wonderland with trees reaching for the sky and every now and then you get a glimpse of the beach when looking west through the mighty trees – it’s just a magical place!
All the pictures I’ve taken were so beautiful it was hard to make a choice, and I haven’t been talking about the sunsets yet, they are also one of a kind when the clouds support them even more pretty and with golden waters as a finish, best sunset in India for me!
Another beach with is further off the tourist radar and that’s why even more interesting is Kalapathar down south, the main beach is busy with tourists and rather small but the real attraction is the walk further on, here the crowd disappears and you’re completely on your own walking through jungle as the way becomes a path and the path becomes a trail through thick beach forest all along the coast, going forever and ever until you reach the most southern part. Big massive trees, some fallen down right at the beach as theirs friends still standing make a pretty good picture, the sun that cut’s through the thick bush – just beginning it’s descent behind the big hill – was illuminating as well for me. The energy levels over here were just wicked and I felt a bit dizzy the afternoon, really loved it and would have gone all the way if not the night was about to dusken in and I didn’t bring a torch, I wasn’t expecting a walk as fabulous as this one!
Also the humidity was unbelievable that day the warm breath of the ocean was kissing me wet the whole afternoon big heavy clouds hanging in the sky that made for a good sunset – even on the eastern side as the moon was rising bright – another perfect day in paradise, and it should become better and better…