The Amari Hotel in Bangkok
Sunday 24.04.2011 - Negombo
Arrived at Colombo International Airport in the evening around 10pm, from there we got a taxi to Negombo where Sarah had booked the hotel called Red Rose Hotel. When we arrived there the building was completely dark, and the whole thing seemed like a scam. After calling the phone of the place a tired looking Sri Lankan guy finally opened the gates and showed us our room. The place was pink, further then that there isn't much to say about it.
Our first Sri Lankan Rupee..
1 EURO is 163 LKR
1 NOK is 21 LKR
Breakfast in Negombo
Breakfast cafe in Negombo
The fish market in Negombo
The Dutch Fort in Negombo, this one was badly damaged during the 2004 tsunami
A cow walking on the street, next to the tuk-tuk
The standard Sri Lanka food :)
Monday 25.04.2011 - Negombo - Kandy
This morning we woke up in Negombo at the Red Rose Hotel, the weather was terrible, it was raining a lot. From our hotel we went direction the city centre to find some place to have breakfast. After a while we found a place where we had breakfast in a nice courtyard. Later we checked the schedule for the bus going to Kandy, and decided to take the bus that departed at 2:30 pm. We got a tuk-tuk around the city to get cash, get our bags, and finally to take us to back to the bus station. The bus was a typical government bus, a really old noisy bus that ended up being completely packed, luckily we got ourselves seats when we left from Negombo. Four hours, and uncountable stops later, we arrived in Kandy. We checked in at the famous Queens Hotel, a really nice old colonial building in the middle of the city. In the evening there wasn't much to do, basically everything closed around 8pm, so after a Lion Lager we went back to the hotel.
Queen's Hotel in Kandy
The view over the city and the lake from the balcony at Queen's
Clock tower in Kandy, every city in Sri Lanka has one, even though no one seems to care about what time it is or how long things take...
Flowers in the botanical garden in Kandy
A monkey in the botanical garden
Tuesday 26.04.2011 - Kandy - Matele
This morning we were planning to rent a motorbike that we could use to get around the hill country for a couple of days, but since there was only one motorbike for rent, and this bike was not working we decided to get a car with a driver for the day. Around 1pm we finally started our trip, the first place we went was the Botanical Gardens in Kandy. Later we drove to the Aluvihara rock cave temple, and to a spice garden close to a place called Matele. In the afternoon we decided to stay at a place called Swiss Dale a bit in the outskirts of Matle instead of going back to Kandy. When our driver left, we decided to go with him to the city centre of Matele to check it out. After having kotto for dinner we went to a bakery, here we got to talk to the people who worked there. Finally we found out that the owner had been living in Norway for 15 years, so he took us to his home to say hello to his family, we chatted with them for a long while before Isac (the owner of the bakery) drove us back to our place.
The Aluvihara rock temple
The view from the Aluvihara rock temple
The local food shops in Matele
The local food shops in Matele
Isac and his Family in Matele
Wednesday 27.04.2011 - Matele - Sigiriya
The night before we were at Isac's place, and he had arranged a car for us the next day, and even offered to come with us to the famous place of Sigiriya a couple of hours north of Matele. The morning started slowly, as everything does in Sri Lanka. We picked up the the car together with Isac before we finally got on our way. We arrived at Sigiriya around 1 am, and it took Sarah and me about 2 hours to go up and down. After we spent a little time in a really nice museum connected to this amazing UNESCO World Heritage Site. In the late afternoon we came back to Matele again, there we went to visit 6 different family members of Isac, and of course we had tea, coffee, or some snacks at each place. People were so welcoming and were very curious about their visitors. After visiting most of Isac's extended family we went back to his home in Matele to have dinner there at 11pm, we were also lucky enough to spend the night there.
Sigiriya
On the way up to the top of Sigiriya
Rock drawings in a cave on the side of Sigiriya
Sigiriya seen from the side
Ruins of the old royal building at the top of Sigiriya
Thursday 28.04.2011 - Matele - Nuwara Eliya
Farhath, and he was coming with us for the last four days of our trip. We started driving at 9am and the first stop on the way was the Labookellie Estate in the hill country. After learning the basics of tea production, and tasting the nice first quality tea, we continued our drive to Nuwara Eliya which is a quite famous tourist destination in the hill country in Sri Lanka. We arrived quite late in the afternoon, found a quite expensive basic room and looked forward to our hike the next morning.
The Mackwood
This is the process of drying the tea leafs
This is the finished 1# quality tea ready for export, none of the best tea is for the local market
Friday 29.04.2011 - Nuwara Eliya - World's End - Mirissa
This morning we woke up at 5:30am, we then drove from Nuwara Eliya on terrible roads up to Horton Plains where the hike to the World's End starts. The walk was 9.2 km, and the landscape reminded us a bit of Ireland. After hiking for nearly three hours we came back to where we started, had a cup of tea. After a quick lunch we started our long drive to Mirissa, which is in the south of Sri Lanka. Because of various strange decisions by our driver, this ended up to be a much longer drive than necessary. We drove via the famous spot called Ella, and saw the beautiful waterfall there, which was the only good thing about our detour. We arrived really late in Mirissa, so the first thing we did was to walk down to the beach to check it out. Since it was completely dark already, we decided to go to the first bar on the beach and enjoy some Lion Lager, which is the local Sri Lankan beer.
Finally arrived at the entrance to the Horton Plains National Park
Sarah and me at World's End
This is the World's End
Baker's Fall
An animal..
Me at the end of the world...
Sarah at the end of the world
Another animal...
Saturday 30.04.2011 - Mirissa - Galle
This morning we had a sleep in, and in the early afternoon we drove the 40km to Galle from Mirissa. In Galle we stayed at the Frangipani Motel in the fort part of the city. The local thing to do in Galle in the afternoon is to walk on the city wall around the fort, so this we did too of course. On our way we met many nice locals, some wanting us to pay them to jump in the water from the fort wall, others wanting to take pictures with us and so on. After walking around the whole fort we decided that is was time for dinner, so we went to the Pedlars Inn Cafe. Before we called it the night we went to a rooftop restaurant to have a Lion Lager with the nice view over the lighthouse in Galle.
The view from my breakfast table
The beach in Mirissa
In Galle, in front of the lighthouse
A fisherman in Galle
The sunset in Galle seen from the fort
Ruins at the fort in Galle
Sunday 01.05.2011 - Galle - Colombo
Sunday morning we had a nice breakfast and mango lassi in the garden of the Frangipani Motel. After breakfast we drove to Colombo where we left our luggage at the famous Galle Face Hotel. In the afternoon we walked around in Colombo Slave district. We had another mango lassi close to a Lake in Colombo before we decided to go for dinner., We had dinner at a nice place before we went back to the Galle Face Hotel, since most places in the city were closed because of the international workers day. We had our last Lion Lager at the hotel before we got a taxi to the airport.
Delicious mango lassi at our place in Galle
Local guy making tea for us
Our street in Galle
This is a beach on the way to Colombo
Really tasty king coconut on the road
Standard Sri Lankan food on our way to Colombo
An alley in the Slave District in Colombo
Just another tuk-tuk
Nce mail boxes in Colombo
One of many nice lorries seen all over Sri Lanka
Monday 02.05.2011
This morning we woke up after a nice sleep in the business class of Sri Lankan Airlines, upgrade is happy days. Now I've checked in to the AETAS hotel in Bangkok where I'll stay for two nights, here I got a deluxe room since I arrived so early in the morning... Happy days :)
Hope you enjoyed this update about Sri Lanka! :)
Cheers, Einar
