Austen Harbour

Austen Harbour is a bay on the western side of North Andaman Island, facing the channels that separate Great Andaman from Interview Island. The indentation is small on the scale of the archipelago, but it offers water protected from the open Andaman Sea. Nearby hamlets and coastal paths converge on this shoreline rather than on a single prominent town.

Behind the bay rise the forested slopes of North Andaman, whose highest ground reaches Saddle Peak. Fresh water, timber and tidal life made the island’s coasts valuable to small communities that moved by boat and foot. The bay’s shallow approaches and limited anchorages kept maritime activity local, tied to fishing and to journeys along the island’s western shore.

North Andaman belonged to the world of the Great Andamanese peoples, including communities such as the Bo. In the centuries before British settlement, forest tracks, creeks and sheltered water were elements of the same seasonal landscape. Austen Harbour’s historical character comes from this narrow meeting of bay, forest and island passage.