On the night watch, a flood of stars makes silhouettes of the sails and two masts of our 62-foot motor-sailing schooner. The elegant Stargazer is living up to her name.

With few other boats in the vicinity, there isn't much to do except gaze at the stars and keep an eye on the green flicker of the radar. While the wind remains more or less in the same direction the autopilot takes care of our course. We've already sailed most of what will be a two-and-a-half-day reach from Phuket to the Andaman Islands, a distance of more than 400 miles.

Stargazer is one of five boats taking part in the inaugural Kata Group Andaman Sea Rally. Not quite the America's Cup, the event is described by the organizers as a "pathfinder mission". The plan is to cruise around a few of these several hundred little-known and mostly uninhabited islands before racing back to Phuket. As we are to discover, this sailing-cum-social rally combines adventure and exploration with serious racing and plenty of old-fashioned fun.

Port Control in Port Blair greets us on the short-wave radio as we approach the green and wooded South Andaman Island on a hot, bright afternoon. "It's lovely to see you," says a crackling voice with an unmistakable Indian accent. "You are all very beautiful."

Even if we don't actually feel very beautiful, it's true — compared with some of the rusted hulks at Chatham Dock — the five yachts from Phuket make a pretty picture.

Port Blair, capital of the Andaman Islands, is a dusty, ramshackle, chaotic, fascinatingly colourful low-rise port town spread around a few bays and docks and over several hills. I hear the honking and the grinding of the traffic on the port road before we even drop anchor. That, together with the glimpse of bright saris and the whiff of Eastern spices, brings me back to India with a jolt.

On terra firma at last, I climb into the back of a decrepit black and yellow Ambassador, that modern-day Indian equivalent of the ox cart, which shares the pot-holed roads with sleeping dogs, goats, chickens, holy cows and open three-wheeled samlors. The car still in motion, the driver opens the door to gob beetle nut on the road. The sound of the traffic reflects the words inscribed on the back of every bus and truck: "Please Sound Horn". He who sounds loudest wins the right of way.

The Andaman Islands are known as Mini-India because the islanders come from all over the country, from Kochi (Cochin) to Kolkata, Mumbai (Bombay) to Chennai (Madras). With many recent arrivals, the population of the Andamans and Nicobars (366,000) is growing. Some of those are descended from prisoners who came here when the islands were a penal colony (1858-1938), while a few may be related to the original tribal inhabitants of the islands, most of whom now live in designated areas.

It isn't possible to get permission to visit the tribal areas, even if you are a scientist or a journalist. To photograph them is strictly forbidden. As for the Nicobar Islands, foreigners aren't even allowed to visit any of the islands, and Indian nationals must get special permission, which is difficult to obtain.

We sail to nearby Ross Island, the now ruined British administrative headquarters and former home to the sahibs and memsahibs of the British Raj. I'm keen to see the sprung dance floor that I'd read about. But, sadly, we find no trace of it; the wood must have rotted away.

We do see the crumbling remains of the bakery, the subordinates' club, the officer's club, the swimming pool (now being re-tiled for the use of visitors to the island), the skeleton of the Anglican Church atop a hill, and the ceme- tery. In its heyday in the early part of the 20th century, Ross Island was known as the "Paris of the East"; it's hard to imagine that now, standing among the haunted ruins and tumble-down walls strangled by the roots of ficus trees.

From Ross Island, the next leg of the rally is over to Havelock Island, a sail of about four hours in a light wind. We then head for uninhabited North Button Island: a piece of paradise, we've been told, where the snorkelling is brilliant.

We have just passed through the channel between John Lawrence and Henry Lawrence Islands, in Ritchies Archipelago. (Who were these Lawrences? I wonder — Brothers who served in the Andamans during the days of the Raj?) It's shortly after noon, and weather conditions are perfect: a nice breeze, clear skies, hot sun. The other boats of the rally are out of sight but still in the vicinity. The powerboat Nina is up ahead, and the motor-sailors Mustang Sally and El Samali are some where behind.

An hour ago we passed another competitor, the well-known racing yacht Stormvógel, winner of many international events (as well as the Phuket-Andamans stage of our rally) and location boat in the film Dead Calm, with Nicole Kidman. She was anchored off Runnymede Point for some scuba diving.

Perhaps they were looking for the wrecks of two British boats that sunk in this area in 1844. In an extraordinary coincidence, unprecedented in maritime history, two sailing barques coming from opposite sides of the world, the Runnymede from London and the Briton from Sydney, had run aground in this same remote spot in the same storm on the very same night. Had we sailed into some sort of nautical Bermuda Triangle?

"We could drop the hook here tonight," says Roger Dietz, owner-captain of Star Gazer and a retired fire-fighter from Oakland, California. He points to a deserted white beach surrounded by mangroves. "Make a campfire."

"Better watch out for the saltwater crocs," says Gareth Twist of Phuket-based Yacht Solutions, and one of the rally organizers. "They're highly aggressive."

"Especially in remote parts," adds David Ratcliffe, a former oil company executive and co-organizer of the event.

Then it hap-pens. At first, there's just a slight change in the sound of the engine. Within a matter of minutes we lose power altogether. Roger dives down into the engine room, soon to re-emerge on deck with sweat on his face but no trace of a smile. "Seems like a serious problem with the transmission," he says. "Raise the sails."

It isn't the most convenient place for our transmission to seize up, but it could hardly have been a more peaceful and beautiful spot. This area of the Andaman Islands has no more sign of human life than the surface of the moon: no other boats, no roads, no houses, no people. Just crystal-clear sea and green islands covered in huge trees and fringed with mangroves and white sand beaches — the perfect location for a Survivor episode.

We never do make it to North Button Island; the legendary snorkelling there remains for us only legendary. Those on the other boats tell us later that the island is indeed beautiful and the marine life wonderful. They made a campfire and a barbecue on the beach and had a great party. But they were bitten to death by sandflies. So much for paradise.

Meanwhile, we sail back down the channel between the two Lawrences, where we drop anchor for the night. Contemplating our situation in the stillness of the mangroves, it's clear we are up the proverbial creek without a paddle. Without power, we can't risk sailing back to the capital, Port Blair, as with light winds and strong currents there's a danger of drifting down towards Sumatra. We have to get a tow, that is certain, and we have to get the transmission fixed as soon as possible.

We don't know it at the time, but this is the beginning of what for Roger is to become weeks of frustrating and costly efforts to repair Stargazer's gearbox. For me, the delay merely affords time to discover aspects of the Andaman Islands that I might have otherwise missed.

The next day Stormvógel, returning from North Button, tows our disabled vessel to Havelock Island, where we remain at anchor for two nights — long enough to discover that Havelock has some beautiful beaches and some relaxed and charming eco-resorts. Havelock is the main tourist island of the Andamans; but with only 5000 foreign tourists (mostly backpackers) per year visiting all the Andaman Islands put together — they fly or ferry from Kolkata or Chennai — they are hardly crowded. The water is very clear here, and when you snorkel you see large fish close to the shore.

You also spot the occasional dugong (also known as the manatee or sea cow). Curiously, some scientists believe that elephants evolved from sea-dwelling dugongs, and that their trunks originally developed as snorkels. Indeed, we've been told it's possible on Havelock Island to see elephants swimming in the sea while breathing through their trunks. Stormvógel owner Ermanno Traverso is keen to film this extraordinary feat for himself. Arrangements are made. Money changed hands. The elephants are brought down to the beach. Ermanno and his friends put on their scuba gear and wade out into the sea.

But on this particular day, the five ellies, including two babies, decide they aren't in the mood for swimming. Instead, they wallow around and play in the blue waters — a pretty sight from the beach — while Ermanno and his friends wait in the water with growing impatience. It just goes to show that you can take an elephant to water but you can't make it swim.

A Le Mans-style start for the race from Havelock back to Port Blair has been arranged to take place on the long, pristine stretch of what is known as No. 7 Beach. One crew member from each of the three participating boats sprints 500 yards up the sand before plunging into the sea to swim out to the tender belonging to his boat. It's a tough and close-fought race. Jed Jennings, from El Samali, collapses just after making it to the tender. It isn't entirely clear whether this is due to his efforts, or because of the many large bottles of Haywards 5000 beer (7.5 percent alcohol) imbibed at the Jungle Resort the night before.

After accounting for handicaps, the race to Port Blair is won by Mustang Sally, with Stormvógel second and El Samali third. The crippled Stargazer returns to Port Blair with some loss of dignity at the end of a yellow towrope. For the next few days, while local mechanics crawled in and out of the engine room, I explore Port Blair.

The town must be one of the few places on earth where the main tourist attraction is a jail. The Cellular Jail is so named because the complex wheel-shaped building is made up of 698 cells, each one 13'6" by 7'6". Every evening a sound-and-light show at the jail provides a moving account of the bravery and endurance of the imprisoned Indian freedom fighters that became martyrs to the cause of Indian independence.

The next day, the Honourable Lieutenant Governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, N. N. Jha, a tall and distinguished elderly man in a beige safari suit, tells me that the Indian people had a special sentimental attachment to the islands because of their association with Indian nationalism. Over coffee and biscuits at his residence, he speaks of the tourist potential of the Andamans, describing them as the "final frontier of tourism". He also talks of great economic opportunities for foreign investors here, and the vast wealth of the fish stocks. "The waters surrounding the Andaman Islands are the only place in the world where fish die of old age," he jokes.

The closest I come to the tribal people is at the Government of India Anthropological Museum in Port Blair, where there are excellent historical photographs and interesting artefacts. There are even one or two rare photographs of the Sentinelese, that wild lot on North Sentinel Island whose idea of a friendly greeting to visitors is to fire poisoned arrows at them. These people still have a stone-age lifestyle that disappeared in other parts of the world some 4000 years ago.

Back on board the crippled Star Gazer, we are told by the local mechanics that our transmission will be ready the next day. "Minor problem," they say, bobbing their heads in the Indian fashion, which means yes, no, I understand, I don't understand, thank you, no thank you and I'm sorry, all at the same time. "Very quickly done."

New to Asia, Captain Dietz is puzzled and frustrated. We catch up with the other crews over tandoori prawns, curried lobsters and lashings of beer at one or another of Port Blair's unpre- tentious but excellent restaurants. We hear of the places that we never got to see.

At the Waves Restaurant, on the beach overlooking Corbyn's Cove, just out of Port Blair, Werner Karasek of the powerboat Nina, normally a man of few words, talks with the excitement of someone who's just returned from another world. With a cruising speed of 24 knots, Nina has covered a lot of sea around the Andamans; among other islands, she's visited the two Sisters, the two Brothers, the two Twins and the two Cinque Islands (pronounced 'sink').

"It's the clearest water I've ever seen," says Werner, "going down metres and metres. We've seen hundreds of manta rays, some of them swimming just below the surface with their fins sticking up just above the water. The islands, the diving, the corals, the marine life — everything has been amazing."

Passing through the passage among the mangroves between Middle Andaman and South Andaman was "like something from National Geographic's Discovery channel," he says. "It is all green — green water, green trees and green mangroves. And lots of colourful birds."

"I think we've been on the wrong boat," says David Ratcliffe.

Returning to Stargazer, we find that Roger's patience has run out. He's determined to leave, come hell or high water. The next day, with a shaky transmission and a 15-knot wind, we set sail for Phuket. For three days the wind keeps up. We see no other boats on the ocean beyond an abandoned bamboo raft.