Emma in London & now in Melbourne: Fave Cousins in Sri Lanka

At the beginning of 2015 Kristy and I decided to go on holiday to Sri Lanka, and finally go travelling together after many childhood years of talking about it. Our itinerary was in a three parts - action packed days of ancient cities and safaris, exploring the cultural centre and tea plantations in the middle of the country, and finally several relaxing days by the beach on the southern coast.

I flew into Colombo and drove straight to Negombo where Kristy and I were meeting and spending our first night. I had a wander and a snooze before Kristy arrived. We were up early the next morning, met our own personal driver for the holiday and didn't waste any time getting started.

Day 1 arrival

King coconuts from the street stall

We headed straight to Wilapattu National Park for our first safari. At Wilapattu we saw a mix of elephants, jackals, water buffalo, tortoise, turtles, crocodiles, warthog, deer, peacocks, monkeys, eagles, rabbits, goanna, and birds galore. A fantastic first experience a safari for me.

In the afternoon we drove to the ancient city of Anuradhapura and got in after dark. For dinner we grabbed a nasi goreng at a local restaurant. The guest house for this night was probably the worst we stayed in over our whole visit - threadbare sheets and mosquitos buzzing everywhere!

On our first full day in Anuradhapura we drove to the Sri Bodhi tree (a descendant of the tree Buddha once sat underneath), and all around the ancient sites of the city. We lunched at a typical rice and curry buffet, drove to see the 2000 year old buddha paintings lining the Dambulla Rock Temple caves, had a freshly squeezed juice from local favourite, Juiceez, and drove off to find our hotel.

Sri Bodhi Tree

Flowers for offerings in the temples

The moonstone

One of the most delicious rice & curry lunches we had

The best tasting pawpaw ever!

Dambulla Caves

Sigiriya Elephant Corridor hotel was one of our favourite hotels, outside the main village and set in a national park. The room was beautiful with a great view, and we were greeted with an unusual but delicious wood apple juice on arrival. The restaurant was international style and the food a little bit disappointing but we ate there most nights out of convenience.

On Tuesday we had an early start to climb the dramatic Sigiriya Rock while it was still cool. It took a couple of hours up and down including wandering the ancient kingdom atop the rock, and through the gardens below.

I ordered a main size of fish cakes so they brought me two entrees!

Breakfast of fresh fruit, the papaya was amazing!

Sigiriya Rock

Before the climb. Climbing chic!

2/3 of the way up, past the giant claws and more rickety stairs

Up on top!

Before lunch we had a short elephant ride which was a novelty at the time but on reflection I thought it was a bit unethical... especially given the afternoon we were about to have. We had rice and curry for lunch and then head to Minneriya National Park to see the gathering of the elephants. It was a wonderful afternoon, and felt like being in the middle of a David Attenborough documentary. We watched hundreds of elephants drinking, eating and playing by the water edge for hours. It was enthralling and one of the highlights of the holiday for me.

First ride on an elephant

The baby

Bath time

The paparazzi

Stealing food from Mum

It was up at dawn again on Wednesday for our last safari, this time at Kaudulla National Park. We ate our packed lunch in the jeep on the way to the park. In comparison to the day before, where the park was filled with 4x4s of tourist paparazzi, we had the entire park to ourselves. There wasn't much to see here other than the bird life, and sadly the tigers we had been hoping to see evaded us again, but it was a very peaceful morning.

A peacock sitting in a tree!

After a tea stop we hit the ancient city sites of Polonnaruwa. We both loved this area, and it was quite compact so we managed to cover a lot of ground before lunch. After another buffet of rice & curry (which we were really enjoying although some days were better than others), we decided to spend the afternoon relaxing by the pool at the hotel. It was our last night at Sigiriya Elephant Corridor so we wanted to make the most of it.

Hot hot sand, and no shoes allowed!

Lunch and lime & soda

The hotel peacocks

The hotel pool

View from our room

rice paddies

On Thursday we had a long drive south to Kandy. Doing the touristy thing, we stopped in at the Ayuverdic spice gardens where all kinds of 'miracles' are concocted. I bought a couple of creams from their 'pharmacy' but have yet to test them out.

The view from the car window that rolled by was a mix of fruit and vegetable stands, king coconuts for thirsty passers-by, women walking with umbrellas in hand to block out the sun, men in sarongs, colourful houses, corn fields, lotto sellers, and tuk tuk drivers whizzing by.

We hit the shops almost as soon as we arrived in Kandy. I stocked up on silk scarves for Christmas presents at a place recommended by our driver. And then we had a fun few hours in a jewellery shop where Kristy and I both designed our own rings and selected our own gems. I had a gold ring with a tsavorite (green garnet) and two pink sapphires either side made. It was all a bit of an impulse but a complete treat!

Shopping was followed by a late lunch, a walk around the Kandy Lake, and a very touristy, cheesy, Kandylan traditional dance show. After we found our villa on one of the hillsides we settled in there for the evening. While it was a lovely place to stay, this is where I think Kristy and I both got upset tummies care of the omelettes we had for dinner.

The best thing to see in Kandy is the Temple of Sacred Tooth. We spent an interesting morning seeing the temple and watching all the locals coming with their offerings, and then took a walk in the botanical gardens.

Spice village

Kandy

Queen's Hotel

Designing my ring

Kandy dancers

At the temple

Temple of the Sacred Tooth

Snack time

Botanic gardens

We had another long drive further south through the hill plantations into tea country for the next phase of the trip staying in Nuwara Eliya. Here we had the one unfortunate hiccup in our trip. Our accommodation was cancelled so we spent a few frustrating hours re-arranging the accommodation for the next few nights to something suitable. In the end it all worked out although it was very disappointing to not be waking up in the misty plantations as we'd wished.

We made the most of the wet and rainy day in Nuwara Eliya and wound our way up through the pretty countryside to Heritance Tea Factory for a tea tasting and have a go at plucking some tea leaves in the morning and had 'high tea' in the afternoon at the Grand Hotel.

Hesitance Tea Factory

Tea tasting

Attempt at tea picking

Tea Time!

It was up at 5:15am the next morning to set off with a local guide to Horton's Plains for a 9km hike and to see the impressive view at World's End before the clouds came in too low. We both really enjoyed the walk after our quiet day before. After a light lunch (much-needed after all that rice and curry in our first week) we hit the road south again to Tangalla. This was our longest drive yet and left us all a little tired. We had a short stop in the hill town of Ella on the way and arrived late after dark.

World's End

Horton's Plains

In Ella

Corn for lunch anyone?

Village scenes...

And so started the beach and relaxing part of our holiday! We had a sleep in that first morning in Tangalla (staying at Turtle Bay on Kalametiya Beach), had a walk on the beach, a drive into town, and an excellent full body ayuverdic massage at the hotel before dinner. It was a wet day, very relaxing and the Sri Lankan breakfast and seafood dinner were great.

Full Sri Lankan breakfast

The bread van with the Mr Whippy tune

We had another sleep in before moving to the next hotel, Apa Villas. This hotel was gorgeous but all open-air so a little damp with the rain. It was close to the beach town of Unawatuna so we took a tuk tuk into town for cocktail hour before another seafood dinner back at the hotel.

Wednesday was perhaps one of my favourite days of the whole holiday. We breakfasted early before taking a tuk tuk to the old fort town of Galle. This was the kind of town we had been expecting to find everywhere and loved it. The towns we had been to previously were dirty, ramshackle places. Galle had a lot more charm with its old buildings and fort wall. We spent the full day shopping, stopping for tea, and walking around the wall. I bought a necklace here for Mum and some jewellery for me too. I read an article about Galle's 'decay chic', and the disrepair of some of the old buildings which I loved the sentiment of and tried to capture. One of our best dinners of the trip was at Elite restaurant eating fresh tiger prawns.

The sun came out for a moment or two the next morning so I raced out to catch it in the lovely pool surrounds before we checked out.

Apa Villas

Alfresco private dining

Tuk tuk in Galle

Galle lighthouse

Decay Chic

Galle Fort

Walking along Galle wall

The sun came out for sunset

Dinner spot

Our next hotel was in Bentota and more around the western coastline which was far sunnier than the southern parts we'd been in. We immediately decamped to the sun lounges and spent the afternoon reading and drinking rose by the pool for a wonderful afternoon.

Friday was another beautiful sunny day. We woke early for a walk on the beach, breakfast, and a last couple of hours by the pool. Glorious. Then it was time to drive to Colombo for our last night. Neither of us was enamoured with the city. We walked through the old Dutch Hospital precinct, and then along Galle Face, the boardwalk facing the ocean. It was alive and buzzing with locals being a Friday night. We had our last dinner at Ministry of Crab - one of the best restaurants in all of Asia - it was delicious but so filling I couldn't even finish it!