430. Andamans trip

In 2022, I had visited Andamans with my family and my mother. One of my school friends also had joined us from Chennai with his kids.  At that time, since there was a tsunami warning, the authorities had stopped all travel between the islands.  So, during the trip, we could not visit the other islands there.  I added those islands to my bucket list for some other trip to be made in future.   One of my college friends got shifted to Andaman and was the overall in-charge for the region there.  He had been inviting me and our other college friends to visit there before he gets transferred to another place😊! 

During November last year, me and some 5-6 college friends decided to visit Andaman with our spouses.  I started looking for options for travel, stay and finalizing the places to see there.  After shortlisting 2-3 vendors, we started discussing amongst our friends as to the likely date of travel.  February was finalized to be good for travel and we decided that we will be there from 9th to 14th February.  Accordingly, I asked the vendors to send me a quote for 10 people.

By start of December, I and my friend Sunil had booked our tickets for the trip and we thought others can book theirs when they decide to come for the trip

In the meanwhile, one friend dropped out saying that he has some marriage in the family on 16th February and he will not be able to attend.  One friend did not come back to me if he was coming and he was dropped. One friend said since his wife is a teacher, she will be busy for the board exams and if he can bring his kids. I said ok.  Later he too backed out saying that since all adults are going, his kids would feel alone without any other kids’ company.  Another friend also had a 25th year marriage celebration in the family on 13th Feb and she also dropped out.  Another friend had some illness and he too backed out.   So, finally we were left with 2 family for the trip, for a total of 4 members.

When I informed the same to my Andaman friend, he said that he will arrange for our stay and travel in Port Blair and we can arrange for the island tour on our own.  So, accordingly I asked the vendors to send me the quote for only the islands trip, the boats for the travel and stay at the hotels in the islands.  Once it was confirmed that there would only be 4 people going for the trip, everything started to fall in place.  After bargaining😊, I and my friend finalized on the rates and paid the advance.  Sunil and me had a phone call to finalise the list of places to see there.  Whenever I go to a place, I google and list out all the places in the area to visit and mostly make sure to visit all of them.  Sunil, on the other hand, wants to spend little time on travel and wants to enjoy the places more.  Accordingly we arrived at a common list of places to visit and finalized the same.  Regarding the places in Port Blair, we had identified some places, but then decided to rely on our Andaman friend to decide on the places.

In the meanwhile, my cousin sister from Chennai called and said that her daughter is getting engaged in Chennai on 8th February and I need to be there for that function.  Luckily, my trip to Andaman was starting from 9th February. So, I decided that I will attend the function in Chennai and head to Andaman from there next day morning.  While attending this function, another cousin said that he will be celebrating his father’s 90th birthday function in Chennai on 14th February.  When I checked my air tickets, I was leaving Andaman on 14th and coming to Chennai by evening.  Luckily, I got to attend this function too😊!

My friend Sunil wanted to stay near the beach on the islands, so I started exploring the hotels that were near the beach.  I found one but found that the reviews were bad online. So, I called the vendor and said that the reviews were not good online. She said the place was renovated recently and we will not face any issues there.  I told her that in case we did not find the place good, she will have to look for some other beach-side accommodation for us.  She said we will like the place. 

With everything set, we reached Andaman on 9th February and left from there on 14th February.  I will continue in my next blog on what we did there😊!

Adios till that time😊!

PS – I had some request from my blog recipients to keep sending the web-series blogs. So, whenever I send a non-web-series blog on Saturdays, I will send the web-series blog on Sundays😊! Hope this suffices!

Comments

  1. Anonymous28 March 2026 at 09:07

    Waiting for the complete blog

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous28 March 2026 at 09:44

    Missed the trip with old buddies, waiting to hear complete story

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous28 March 2026 at 10:21

      While writing comments, please identify yourself😊! Makes my reply better😊!

      Delete

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