Andaman Diary : Day1 : Boarded the ship for Port Blair

19th Dec 2008
Long distance ship travel is a unique experience; which I am very much looking forward to it.


Visakhapatnam Port Gate

For 10AM ship we were supposed to reach the Vizag Port gate by 7AM. The actual boarding started by 8AM.


Big ships loading and unloading.

Vizag port is a busy place with lot of cargo ships getting loaded and unloaded.


Big cranes for big cargos.


M.V.HARSHAVARDHANA

Baggage was scanned and the embarkation card was collected by the ship crew as we entered the ship(M.V.HARSHAVARDHANA), then we were directed to our A-block bunks.


Bunk Beds

Frankly speaking, when I first looked at it, it was much better than I had expected it to be. I had imagined it to be a small crammed room with 6 bunk beds, like it was in titanic. But to my surprise it was a big room with 30 bunk beds and two big fans.


Long clean corridors, but they wont be clean for long !!!

Ship has long corridors.

Even the bunks are air-conditioned but don’t raise your expectations, because they are not very effective and the bunks become hot and humid. Anyways, on the first day atleast they were working.


Calm Sea

To our advantage the weather was perfect for sea travel, the sea was calm and ship was hardly turbulent. Before boarding the ship, it is must to take sufficient supplies of snacks, because the onboard shop is not good. It mostly sells water, biscuits, chips and limited cold-drinks. We have taken enough supplies for next 3 days. There is a library on board with a good collection of old books. I have picked up a real life work named “Serengeti shall not die”. There is a dispensary as well with fixed timings and 24hr emergency facility. For Cabin class passengers, a separate dining is available. But I am traveling bunk, so today had gone to Bunk dining hall.


Bunk Class Dining Hall

The food in bunk was hopelessly bad, but there is a good option in the form of buying meal passes for Cabin class dining hall, which I have asked for. Hopefully tomorrow, we will have better meals.


Cabin Class Dining Hall


Open space at the back.

There is a big open space at the rear end of the ship, which is the primary muster station. It has a shed with lot of benches under it and a Television set. Yeah, we do get to watch movies at ship. The open space serves as a big bed as well, just had to carry our sleeping bags and we can have the luxury of sleeping under the stars with an amazing wind.