Category: Sri Lanka

After screaming back up the very touristy west coast and into Colombo, with a pit stop at the very cool old Dutch Galle Fort, I was forced to find a room in what was supposed to be the lesser, less preferred annex of my guesthouse. At least according to reviews on Trip Advisor. As it turns out, I think the annex is much nicer. A little noisier due to traffic, but that’s what earplugs are for.

Awaiting my redeye to Bangkok for the weekend, I decided to blow off Lonely Planet and just go explore some neighborhoods in hope of finding how the other half – in this 3rd world country – live. I only saw one McDonalds the whole time I’ve been here, which is a bit of a symbol of middle to upper class in a 3rd world country, so I caught a tuk tuk to Mickey D’s and started snooping around from there. At first I couldn’t really find anything worth exploring, but eventually I got a few blocks over from the busy main streets and found all kinds of interesting back streets full of mansions and important government offices. There was the very swish looking Prime Minister’s office, the huge mayor’s mansion, many government office (including one for the dictionary of Sinhalese, the local language), the Russian Embassy, and the United Arab Emirates embassy – with a long line out the front door. Probably Sri Lankans hoping to work there. There were also nice shady lanes that snuck past huge houses behind big walls with very expensive cars out front and numerous servants tending and guarding important things like Hummers.

While snooping around I also stumbled across a compound of museums and popped in to check out the main Colombo / Sri Lanka history / cultural museum. The building itself was probably the most impressive. Huge and built in the late 1800’s. It was full of artifacts from thousands and thousands of years of Buddhist, Hindu, Dutch, British, and Sri Lankan history. It was an interesting place to see after traveling around the country because there was quite a bit of reference to places I had been. Afterwards I caught my last crazy tuk tuk back to my hotel for dinner and waited for my airport limo to whisk me away into the night for my redeye.

A few final thoughts on the big drive around Sri Lanka. The country isn’t really all that big (about 300kms across) but it does take significant time to get from place to place due to sharing the limited road network with 20 million other cars, stray dogs, bicyclists, trucks, buses, tuk tuks, farm machinery, and walkers as well as dealing with repeated winding switchback roads up and down mountains.

My driver, who goes by the name Francis, may have been past retirement age and with only one good eye, but he seemed to handle the drive well with his 35 years of tour driving experience. Francis was very nice and polite. He was definitely Old School, addressing me as ‘Sir’ and always discretely disappearing from the dinner table when my meals were served to go eat with the other drivers/servants in the back room. I thought about inviting him to join me, but his English was terrible and conversations were very difficult. In addition, I’m pretty sure he was paying far less than the tourist prices I was repeated stuck with paying.

Francis told me that he actually retired from driving several years ago after his wife died. He decided to come back to work after finding it too boring and unsociable to hang out by himself at home. He drove a Nissan station wagon that reminded me of one of my old cars in the U.S. It had over 330,000 kms on it and he treated it like delicate china. He liked the doors closed very gently and drove painfully slowly over any bumps he came across – which drove me a bit crazy, especially after having just barreled around the Australian Outback on 4wd tracks in my Rav4 last month. The safari tour in the Land Rover was completely at the opposite end of the spectrum, which made it extra fun.

The crazy chaotic Sri Lankan driving was actually handled very well by Francis. Honking horns are used constantly to alert other cars of your passing or other people walking along the road. I filmed several videos with my iPhone I will upload when I get the chance. I was amazed to see no accidents for most of the journey, but then found a big rolled truck on a switchback mountain road and another more minor front-end crash the following day. Stray dogs were running around everywhere, but they always seemed to know how to get out of the way of cars at the last minute. I only saw one dog dead in the road from being hit on our entire journey. Francis actually told me that most of the dogs were owned by people, but they certainly seemed to run around like they were stray and many did not look particularly well.

Final Sri Lanka Drive

Much of the trip was in silence, unfortunately, because it was just too hard to communicate in English. He could recite interesting facts about Sri Lanka and the sites we visited fairly well, but if I ever said anything I would have to repeat myself over and over – phrasing things in different ways – before he finally could understand what I was saying. 90% of the time he would completely misinterpret what I said and start talking about a different unrelated topic. It was just too frustrating to try and keep a conversation going.

Being a devout Buddhist, my driver would conduct a brief prayer on his steering wheel every morning before we headed off. He would also discreetly prop his hands up in a prayer gesture and bow his head every time we passed a statue of Buddha.

Spent the night in the mountains near Sri Lanka’s highest peak. A very nice old town where the British used to send their people during the hottest months of the year so they could cool off a bit. The town is still full of big luxurious British government homes, a big golf course, and a horse racing track. Today many of the big homes are either hotels or occupied by the very wealthy. It is downright cold at night and I had to bundle up in thermals to sleep – which always seems a bit weird in the tropics. The area is surrounded by market gardens and tea plantations and spectacular views.

From here my driver and I made our descent back to hot, humid, sea level, dropping off at a few more temples along the way, to eventually visit the world famous Yala National Park. Yala National Park has elephants, bears, water buffalo, crocodiles, wild peacocks, wild boars, deer, monkeys, hornbills, and most importantly, leopards. You can not visit the park without a guide and roads in the park require a 4wd truck, preferably a Land Rover. My guide, a long time local and somewhat of a cowboy among the guides, was laughing at all the cheap Indian 4wd vehicles getting bogged in the mud.

Yala National Park Safari

I had a great time on my safari, but unfortunately did not get the chance to see any leopards or bears due to the fact that it was raining. Leopards and many other animals like to take cover to get out of the rain. I did manage to see everything else, however, which was really pretty amazing. Half the fun was just banging around the rough roads in the old beat up land rover. The guides all seemed to know each other and would give hand signals to each other to let everyone know what kinds of animals had been spotted and where. An index finger curved down meant elephant and a hand extended like it was holding an egg at its finger tips meant a leopard (outlining a leopard’s spot).

After Kandy we headed off into the mountains, which is always a bit of a relief when sweating in the tropics. As soon as we started to climb up the switchback roads, we immediately found ourselves in tea plantation country. In Sri Lanka, aka Ceylon, tea is still hand picked by Indian Tamil people whom the British brought in to work for their tea plantations. Today descendants of those original Indians continue to do the back breaking work in rain and shine. The higher the elevation of the tea, the better the quality. The women out picking tea leaves seem happy to be photographed, perhaps to break up the monotony of their days. Tea leaves are picked every 10-12 days, so finding pickers to photograph can be tricky.

I visited a tea factory where the tea is converted from green leaf to final cut black tea. Interestingly, the factories only operate at night to keep the tea cool during the processing. When you tour the factory they can only show you the machinery. They also cut and sort tea to different grades/sizes that influence the strength of the tea and then sell it that way wholesale to tea retailers. The tea retailers then mix up the grades to create their own blends.

I decided to join the throngs of Buddhist pilgrims to climb the 5,200 steps to the top of Adam’s Peak, one of the taller mountains in Sri Lanka. Adam’s Peak is where, legend has it, Adam stepped down to earth from the heavens. The scuttlebutt on hiking to the top is that you wake up at 2am (!) and start climbing the steps by 2:30am in order to get to the top before sunrise and witness the beauty of the surrounding mountain ranges at dawn. The route is fairly well lit and actually has booths of food, trinkets, and toys all the way up it. When you first leave your guesthouse to start the climb you can see the trail of lights heading straight up into the sky, which looks pretty impressive.

Adam’s Peak 5200 Step Climb

Unfortunately, I chose an unusually busy day to attempt the climb. I probably got up around 4000 steps before I came to a screeching halt behind hundreds or thousands of Buddhist pilgrims trying to do the same thing – or possibly even making the climb for legitimate religious reasons (there is a temple on top). I waited in the line for about two hours while it didn’t budge. The sun rose, so I decided to bail and at least photograph what I could on the descent. Yes, it was a hard climb and a difficult-on-your-knees decent, but it was nice to see the mountains from near up top. In fairness to those in line for genuine religious reasons, it was probably best for me to give up my space in line, anyway.

Afterwards my driver scheduled me in for a nice surprise Ayurueda treatment to have my legs massaged. Very nice, and I think it certainly helped.

Did a bit of a run around Kandy for several hours before heading off for the mountains in south central Sri Lanka. There were a few factories I was shepherded into. One was a wood carving factory that produced many elephants and other objects that looked very familiar to me from international craft shops in the USA. I was being given the hard sales pitch when suddenly I was saved by busloads of other tourists who flooded in to distract the sales employees working there. I also visited a batik clothing factory a few doors down the street that wasn’t nearly as interesting.

Made a short visit to Kandy’s Botanical Gardens, which were nice (especially the orchid gardens). The place was full of young romance. It is kind of funny when you see the young couples trying to be affectionate until they notice you (or anyone else) and quickly cease all physical contact with each other. Obviously public displays of affection and taboo ’round these here parts!

The big visit of the day was a special temple in Kandy that houses one of Buddha’s teeth in a golden casket. The place was a mob scene of Buddhists making a pilgrimage to the temple to pray and leave a special offering for the monks to deliver. I did manage to catch a glimpse of the golden casket which is opened once a year for a ceremony, but it kind of reminded me of the time I saw the Mona Lisa in Paris at the Lourve and could only just glimpse it due to the sheer numbers of others there.

Many elderly and sick people in Sri Lanka clearly seem to have medical conditions which would likely be addressed in the West. Things like glaucoma, arthritis, hip and knee problems, etc. It would appear the fervor of religiousness may be a substitute for their ability to get medical care. So many people making these religious visits appear to be suffering from health problems, unfortunately.

The food here in Sri Lanka has been very good. Nice and spicy but not too hot. Sri Lanka is famous for their spices. And tea, of course! Some friends in Perth mentioned that they stuck to vegetarian offerings while traveling through Nepal to avoid food poisoning, so I have been following their advice. Every place I have stayed has offered a free generous breakfast with things like eggs, crepes, fresh fruit, coffee, toast, and lots of other stuff I avoid because meat’s involved. When they serve you lunch or dinner, they seem to like to present everything on as many plates as possible. It looks like a huge banquet when you get started and you definitely feel very full afterwards even without any meat. Everything I’ve so far has been very tasty. And it’s usually super cheap unless it’s a touristy place. A full dinner seems to come in around $6.50 or so.

Made my way to Kandy today with several more stops at Buddhist and Hindu temples. They’re nice to see, but you do tend to get a bit ‘templed out’ after a while. Lots of Buddha statues sit prominently on mountain tops in the area. Also lots of Buddha statues and frescos can be found in caves. There are often lots of monkeys running around these shrines. We managed to hit a Hindu temple while a big celebration was going on inside, which was interesting. Today being Friday was Muslim holy day and we saw huge crowds of Muslims leaving their services as well

My driver told me that about 32% of Sri Lanka is Buddhist, 12% Hindu, 12% Muslim, and all others, including Christian make up the remaining lesser percentages.

I also stopped by a herb garden on our travels today. I knew it was going to be a sales pitch the moment I hopped out of the car and was greeted by a personal tour guide. He showed me all kinds of things growing including vanilla, cocoa, coconut, nutmeg, turmeric, almonds, and lots more. He also discussed how each was used for medicinal purposes in traditional Sri Lankan Ayurveda alternative medicine. Of course by the end he was pitching products from their pharmacy. I politely declined and he graciously backed off, but then proceeded to prod me for a tip. On the way out my driver was slipped some free bottle of potion, so I suspect there was some incentive for him to bring me there. I had a similar experience at a ‘gem museum’ yesterday which was really a showroom to buy Sri Lankan gems from, but they also politely backed off when I told them I wasn’t interested in buying any.

On the whole Sri Lankans have been consistently friendly, warm, and accommodating with minimal hassle factor. Also, younger Sri Lankans seem to speak and understand English much better than their elders. English is taught in schools here and I was told 80% know it, but I think many have forgotten all but a few words like with me and Spanish. Sri Lanka reminds me of elements of Egypt, India, and Thailand so far.

Kandy is the cultural capital of Sri Lanka, but it does seem a bit smaller for being 2nd in size to Colombo. Kandy is on a beautiful lake and is full of busy bustling markets, temples, and chaotic traffic. I spent a few hours running errands around town this afternoon and lost my driver in the process. Unfortunately, I was forced to call my hotel back in Colombo to have them contact him – which didn’t make him look very good, but I really had no other choice.

All good now, but for some reason I’ve found myself in a hotel with no other guests. Hmmm…

Off on day two of my customized tour with James. Actually his name is Francis. We headed off 60kms to the west to see some historic ruins from the 1100’s. Before he started the car he quietly performed a Buddhist prayer at the steering wheel of his car. Very nice drive with much less traffic than we had yesterday. We saw quite a few wild animals along the way including 4 elephants (!) which he even said was very unusual. Elephants are generally nocturnal so you are unlikely to see them during the day. They are also dangerous animals nobody wants to get too close to, so I kept my distance when photographing them. Some were huge, others were babies. We also saw wild peacocks and evidence of many cobras. Cobras burrow into termite mounds to eat the insects, which is pretty amazing when you this about how tough termite mounds are.

The historic Buddhist temples were very beautiful and reminded me of Sukhothai in Thailand (which perhaps was a little nicer, but mainly due to a car-free district surrounding them and the close proximity of all the ruins together).

Either I’m much more used to hustlers these days of Sri Lanka is pretty tame compared to other countries I’ve visited. They don’t seem to be too aggressive in their sales tactics at sites, but they do seem to mumble something under their breaths when you turn them down. Cursing? Who knows what they’re saying…

So my driver rocks up bright and early to start showing me around the island over the next seven days. I was told he spoke English and drove a good car. Well, he was quite old, his car was too, and his English was very poor. By lunch time I also realized that he appeared to be blind in one eye – but by then it was a bit late to do anything about it. The air-conditioning in the car seems practically nonexistent at times, but seems to kick in when he takes his foot off the gas.

That all being said, he seems to be a good driver and a nice guy who seems eager to make sure I’m happy with his tour. His English seems okay when he has something to tell me tour related, but if I ask him any questions he seems to have a very hard time understanding what I’m saying. After six hours of driving through mostly traffic jams, we finally arrived at a nice hotel spread out under a nice cool forest of rain trees that is close to one of the sites I wanted to see. My tour fees include bed and breakfast, the driver and the car/fuel, but not the entrance fees to some of the sites.

Like many 3rd world countries, Sri Lanka charges one inflated price for visitors and a much cheaper price for locals. I was initially a bit put off by the entrance price of Sigiriya Rock (about $25), but after visiting the place felt it was well worth it. It is this amazing old fort from an empire in the 5th century that made use of this enormous rock for protection from enemies. The ruins at the bottom are very cool to wander around, but the climb to the top, where the king kept his thrown, was absolutely amazing. The stairs they put in were scary enough for us to climb, but the actual ladders used by the original inhabitants were baffling. There were beautiful frescos of Indian gods painted in some caves on the way up and amazing views of the very green countryside below and mountains and lakes in the distance.

After a 2am arrival at my hotel in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in which my driver had to repeatedly ring the doorbell to wake up the night watchman, I arose to find a nice buffet breakfast waiting for me downstairs as part of the deal. Afterwards I walked about a block and a half to a golden beach and walked up and down it past numerous cheap hotels, cafes, and restaurants. There were plenty of stray dogs roaming around and a train line to cross that has the widest gauge tracks I have ever seen.

My plan for the day? Get some money changed over, inquire about tours, pop into the center of town to see what there was to see and compare tour prices, and then return to the hotel. Simple enough, I thought. Well, the money changing, which is very simple and straightforward in Singapore (just rock up to a man behind some glass and fork over your dough for his dough) seemed very beaurocratic. There were numerous pieces of paper to fill in, passport requirements, and endless double-checking and running around between desks in the chaotic bank office. What would have taken seconds in Singapore took me hours in Colombo.

Next I tried to find out about tours through the head of my hotel, but her English was good, she kept telling me to tell her exactly what I wanted to see (when I was hoping for advice on what was worth seeing), and a bit cagey when I asked her about prices. She was also busy talking with others much of the time so I finally gave up and decided to hop a tuk tuk into the center of town to see what other tours might be on offer.

The tuk tuk ride had been recommended by the hotel as the safest option for getting into town due to pickpocketers, but the drive in was long and crazy. I felt like the ride was a long game of bumper cars – except you never actually hit anyone. Just constant near misses! At the end of it the tuk tuk driver ripped me off my short changing me the equivalent amount to the entire trip (not much, but still). Welcome to Sri Lanka!

Colombo is very busy and noisy and full of crowded markets and chaotic traffic. Every time I ventured towards what looked like an interesting historical part of town it turned out to be some high security government office I would be waived away from by security guards.

It seemed hard to find any information at all about touring the island. The most common way to see the island seems to be in hiring a driver (for the price of renting a car) and have them chauffeur you around to all the big sites on the island. I attempted to walk the whole way back to my hotel but gave up after about 15kms. When I tried to buy a soft drink to rehidrate, the shop owner insisted I drink it on the spot so he could hold on to the bottle. Perhaps he just sent it back to the bottling plant to be refilled, but it sounded a bit dodgy to me so I declined the opportunity.

Finally back in my hotel I flipped through my Lonely Planet with my hotel manager and told her what I was interested in seeing. She said she would call her driver and get a quote on the price. It all worked out in the end, but paying for the tour became a major nightmare due to the price – which wasn’t that bad by Western standards, but converted into Sri Lankan Rupees made it sound astronomical. Atms wouldn’t pay out that much in a day and I couldn’t find an American Express office to cash a check. Finally after much scheming to pay for it I noticed a Visa / MasterCard machine under their front desk – even though I had already specifically asked if the took any credit cards (No! They said). So after much headache running around about yet another issue it was all easily resolved with a credit card.