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Published: January 3rd 2012
M – I really wasn’t expecting that I would be tucking into a Turkey Dinner this Christmas and I certainly wasn’t expecting it to be cooked by my wife! Kate is a great cook but she isn’t a fan of preparing traditional English roast dinners and is always looking for alternatives to turkey to cook for her Christmas lunch. This year she thought she had escaped the task, but little did she know ...
The couple who run the guest house we stayed at had recently returned from 14 years in Dubai where they had gotten accustomed to a traditional English Christmas dinner and fancied trying to prepare one themselves in Sri Lanka. They had managed to source a roast turkey from one of the larger local hotels and a Christmas cake from I don’t know where. Kate offered to help peel and prep the vegetables. I offered to keep out of the way!
Surprise, surprise it took about 30 minutes in their tiny kitchen before Kate had to take over as the Sri Lankan lady of the house turned out never to have cooked a roast dinner before and had no idea what needed to be cooked and
when (I tried desparately not to laugh). There was also no oven so they deep fried the roast potatoes (very good, highly rcommended!). Kate also managed to prepare 3 other traditional vegetable diishes plus a gravy from scratch (no Bisto) using burners and a wok. Impressive.
Meanwhile I kept to my word and kept out of the way watching You Tube blooper videos ...
Lunch was a great success. We even had stuffing! I don’t think the French family who were also staying could believe their luck at such a great Christmas spread. The wine though was a little suspect. The only elements missing were our own families, the Queen’s speech and the ubiquitous Christmas Crackers and paper hats! Thanks Kate it was much apprciated by all! The Sri Lankan extra was the monkeys trying to get into the house to steal the food as they had done the fruit on the day before!
We still weren’t feeling that great by Boxing day (Dec26th) so it was a quiet one spent watching Indiana Jones and Harry Potter movies and live English Football. Very much like home except without the cold turkey and stuffing sandwiches (because basically we
A Monkey helps himself to the flowers
Unfortunately I wasn't quick enough to get a good photo of him poshing his nose against the window trying to see inside the house!had eaten all the turkey and stuffing).
Our colds weren’t really improving and we decided that hiking in the hills was a non-starter. As such we took the 7 hour bus ride via the picturesque hills of Ella and then down and along the south coast to Marissa. Here we expected the weather to be a little warmer to aid our recovery and we were right.
Marissa is the Blue Whale watching capital of the world. After a little searching we lucked out again on our guest house. This time we found a quiet spot just off the beach where the rooms were so new the owner was still putting the finishing touches to his last room. We intended to stay for a day or two and move on to Galle for New Year. However we still weren’t feeling well and the room and the guest house was so nice we decided to stay in Marissa for the New Year.
The crescent shaped beach at Marissa reminded us of Palolem in Goa but a little smaller and a less developed. Palolem was one of the most relaxing places we have visited on our trip so we decided
to replicate that and spend the next few days recuperating whilst listening to the sounds of the waves.
Partially recuperated, we were well enough to watch the Villa stuff Chelsea 3-1 on New Years eve (all sing along - Jingle bells, Jingle bells, Jingle all the way, Oh what fun it is to see the Villa win away …) before joining the rest of the partiers on the beach.
Most of the bars had erected small portable bars right down on the sand and many had large bonfires going to attract customers to their venue. By the time we arrived at 10pm the party was in full swing all the way along the beach with people drunkenly dancing around bonfires in the sand to different tunes from different bars. At midnight the fireworks started … and continued …
A word of warning - be careful trying to take a romantic walk along the waters edge when the locals are shooting rockets into the sea. We saw many a couple abandon their walk along the shallows and dive for cover as either rockets zipped over their heads or young boys came running past them to throw a bangers
into the air over the water. We enjoyed the chaos from a couple of comfortable chairs a few yards safely behind the front lines!
The next day we decided we were well enough to go whale watching. I am usually the kiss of death to these tours but having been told they were seeing whales on every trip and that we could go out again if we didn’t see any we took our chance. On a very relaxing and well organized trip we saw plenty of dolphins and got to spend a good amount of time watching a couple of whales dive and surface near the boat. Apparently what we saw wer a couple of Fin Whales a much smaller looking version of the Blue Whale. Although we didn't see Blue Whales it was a nice relaxing trip.
Next we are moving further along the coast to towards Unawatua and the old Dutch Fort town of Galle.
Scroll down and page on to see more photos of the oddly english Nuwara Eliya and the beach at Marissa.
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