The Indians are good at rules, especially in the Andaman Islands.  Everyone is very nice.  Our local agent, Port Control, Port Radio, Customs, Immigration and Coastguard; all are nice.  But they are all armed with rules.  Normally cruisers wake up, look at the weather and decide, based on wind, where to go.  Not here.  I submit my cruising itinerary for the next 30 days.  I can change it but frankly it is easier to motor into a head wind and head sea for 20 odd miles than it is to make a change.

Many areas are prohibited as they are strict nature reserves or tribal protection areas such as North Sentinel Island where an idiotic American got himself killed recently.  No one is sure how many people live there.  Estimates vary between 50 and 150, no one knows what language they speak.  We all know that they will have no resistance to western diseases.  Look at what happened to the Incas.

So to keep track of us we have to report our position twice a day at 0800 and 1700.  Email would normally be an easy way to do this but 3G coverage is sparse to nothing, weak at best and foreigners are restricted to minimal daily downloads.  Luckily I have an SSB radio with a range of over 1,000 miles.  But reception can be poor.  Sat ‘phones do not help.  They are not allowed anywhere in India.  All sat ‘phones were sealed in bonded lockers and the boats with built in satellite systems had them disabled.

I have to make my chartplotter draw a track of everywhere I go and photograph this each day and then print the photographs when I get back to Port Blair for departure so that I can prove where I have been.

There is no commercial fishing here as it is just too far from major markets; so just fishing for the local community.  The sea is teeming with fish.  It is said that most die of old age.  So logically there is a rule banning us from fishing.  We are told if we are caught fishing our boat will be confiscated.

So far the islands are beautiful, not just as pristine as you would imagine but much cleaner than mainland India.  Mind you, everywhere in the world is cleaner than mainland India.  Every boat is doing its own thing so in different place I bump into different people.  Lots of variety. And while there is a strong tourist industry here it is almost entirely Indian tourists.  So white people like me are a novelty…