I already wrote about traveling to Neil island in my first post about the Andaman and Nicobar islands. The procedure to get to Havelock from Neil Island was pretty much the same. It is the same ferry company (Makruzz) opreating between the islands, and the ferry we took was actually the same exact ferry that took us from Port Blair to Neil Island. We were even assigned the same exact seats!
On the day of the departure, we decided to sleep a little longer, because we were not going to the beach. What we did not know, however, was that the check out time was as early as 10:30! That was not something I had never encountered before, but we talked to the receptionists and they agreed to give us a later check out. I do,however, understand why the check-out time is that early: there are only a few ferries arriving a day, so they want to make sure that the rooms are ready for the people arriving with the next ferry. We had breakfast and waited at the Dugong restaurant before taking the rickshaw to the jetty. We figured it was better to wait in the hotel with a beer than by the jetty with our suitcases, because there is nowhere even to sit down over there.
When we finally got to the jetty port, we had to first go to the Makruzz office to verify our tickets. It is important to mention that you should call the Makruzz office the day before to make sure the ferry runs as scheduled. At first, I thought the purpose of the phone call was to verify your ticket, but that was not the case, it was only to check whether there are no changes in the schedule. Of course, we went to the wrong office at first. There are two ferries going from Neil Island; the Makruzz, and the governmental ferry, which I believe is only for the locals. It is not very clear where to go, but we finally found the ticket office and had our tickets verified. There was no need to show our passports like we had to in Port Blair, and there was also no security control this time. I guess that if we already went through the security control in Port Blair, it was enough. It is not like there are many other ways to get to the islands anyway.
We entered the ferry and the ferry departed around 15-20 minutes earlier. On the ticket, it is written that we should be at the jetty port 1 hour before the scheduled deprature time. The fact that the ferry left that much earlier made me understand the importance of actually being there 1 hour earlier. As mentioned earlier, I would recommend buying the ticket online (the sale opens 1 month in advance), unless you are a backpacker and haven’t booked your accommodation yet. The reason why I recommend buying the ticket in advance is because the ferry was almost completely full, although the islands were quite empty! I can imagine that once the high season is fully started, getting tickets for the ferry on the same day can become an issue
There were absolutely no waves on the way to Havelock. Again, we were served a sandwich with ketchup and free water while watching Bollywood music videos on the TV screens. I think the whole trip took around 50 minutes. I was really curious about the beaches in Havelock, and my expectations had lowered after Neil Island. However, when we were onboard the ferry and saw the island from far away, it looked like there were many beautiful white beaches on Havelock. But the Bharatpur beach did also look beautiful from far away, we thought.
Onboard the ferry, we met some really nice Indian ladies who kept feeding us Indian snacks. Apparently they were on a girls only trip and came from all over India. These women had traveled a lot around the world, including the Maldives and Mauritius, and were just as disappointed as I was with the beaches of Neil Island (although the Bharatpur beach was really not to bad in the end!).
When we arrived at the jetty port in Havelock, we instantly saw a different kind of the Andaman Islands that we had gotten to know so far. You could really tell that this island had been open for tourists much longer than Neil Island, and that much more was invested here. The jetty port was bigger, the roads were wider (and with less wholes!), and there were also pavements for the pedestrians! We took the rickshaw to our hotel from the jetty port.. Surprisingly, the rickshaws here were much smaller than on Neil Island, and we barely fit with our two suitcases. However, in the end we arrived safely at the hotel regardless of the very uncomfortable ride.
See my next posts for more information about Havelock island.
Anyah Mroz 