About 50 miles north of the Button Group, Maya Bundar is the administration centre for Middle and North Andaman.
Call on Ch.16 on approach and report to the Harbour Master’s office on arrival. Reasonable provisioning is available here: fresh vegetables, meat, fish, chicken, butter and cheese in cans and even ice cream! There are the usual telephone, fax and internet facilities and also mobile phone coverage.
There is a government rest house close to the harbourmasters office overlooking the bay, with a good restaurant and friendly people. Austen Strait is too shallow to be navigable by a keel boat but is a very interesting dinghy trip. Be aware that there are many very large salt water crocodiles that live in Austen Strait, so keep a good lookout.
82 miles from Chatham island, Port Blair
Anchor in 7-10 metres off Alves Island (a small backpacker camping area) about two miles from the village. Take the tender ashore. There is good coral off Alves Island.
