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Published: December 9th 2007
19th Nov - 7th Dec 2007
Ella - Mirissa (Galle, Unawatuna, Bentota) - Hikkaduwa - Kandy - Negombo
After a free departing cup of tea from our guesthouse in Ella we trundled off to the bus station (otherwise known as the side of the road). Three bus journeys and six hours later we hopped off possibly while the bus was still in motion at a tiny village called Mirissa. The road we travelled on has been completely rebuilt since the tsunami and so barely a pot hole in it and quite a comfortable journey. The drivers were as mad as ever though and I had a front row seat, Claire was at the back (it was all that was left, we haven't fallen out). We came the closest yet to steamrolling a stray dog but I think after some late swerving and slamming of brakes we missed it - there was certainly no bump or yell! It made me bolt upright and the guy next to me grabbed my arm in expectant horror!
We found a place to stay for Rs220 (that's less than a pound) which is by far the cheapest accommodation we have had to date
anywhere - we've never paid less than 2.50 pounds before! It was basic but far from the worst we have lodged in. Our first full day in Mirissa was spent on the beach - after two and a half weeks away from the sea our tans needed topping up. At the end of the day we were walking back to our guesthouse and discussing how wonderful the complete absence of hawkers, oglers and general harassers was - only just at that moment we were whistled at. We ignored it. We were whistled at again so we turned around expecting some half baked story from a local leading to 'come and have a look in my shop, looking is free!' when we saw your man Thierry again! We arranged to meet for a quadruple gin and tonic later (also costing a pound!) where we met an English guy and his daughter (the father, Chris, is going to all three England test matches).
The next day we went to Galle with Thierry to look around the old Dutch fort area which Galle is famous for. Due to its high wall most of the buildings inside were largely undamaged by the tsunami.
5.30pm Gin & Tonic time!
That's all gin in there!The same cannot be said for the cricket ground which lies just outside these walls. The ground is being rebuilt and was to be the venue for the opening test match on 1st December until they realised it wouldn't be finished in time. It is now the venue for the final test match on 18th December. I still don't think it will be ready - take a look at the pictures and form your own opinion!
On the way back to Mirissa we had lunch at Unawatuna. This was likely to have been our next beach destination but the number of tourists, hawkers, touts, snake charmers and people with dressed up monkeys on a small lead (not sure what you call these people!?) lining the beach deterred us slightly and we came scurrying back to our tiny haven of tranquility.
However, despite our room being quite habitable and an absolute steal, it is quite near the roadside and bus drivers just love to sound their horn at all times of the day and night. We therefore moved to where Thierry was staying - directly below him in fact - where we were a stones throw from the beach
and all we could hear were the crashing of waves. No sooner had we got there though and Thierry checked out! It was nothing personal, he has a plane to catch back to France and needed to be nearer the airport. A shame all the same (try saying that after a quadruple gin and tonic!).
The 'cabanna' cost over three pounds but it was definitely worth the upgrade! We had felt like children at the previous guesthouse as we were always being asked where we were going, what time we wanted dinner, etc. We tried to sneak in and out of our room but were always caught. We felt a little guilty when we left as apart from one other guy who never comes out of his room we were the only guests.
The next few days were pretty much the same. Got up around 8am, breakfast on our terrace, wandered twenty yards to the beach, sunbathed, frolicked in the sea, wandered back twenty yards for lunch amd then it depended on the weather as to our afternoon activities! It would quite often cloud over so the afternoon could be as varied as beach, napping or the internet!
Dinner would alternate between the guesthouse and a couple of restaurants on the beach and would always consist of either rice and curry or fish!
The only occasions we interrupted this routine was firstly to go to the nearest town, Matara, (where we got stuck in a huge traffic jam to rival the M25) to buy some more books to help keep our busy lifestyle occupied! The only other occasion was to visit a Sea Turtle Sanctuary about two hours north by bus in a place called Bentota. The visit was a rather hurried affair but very enjoyable and we got to hold some too. There weren't many turtles as they appear to be still re-stocking after the tsunami but they did have a rare albino turtle (one in 500,000 are born albino) which was aptly named Michael Jackson. The main reason for the sanctuary is to protect the eggs that are laid on the beach from fishermen and predators. They keep them for forty eight days until they hatch and then another three days in water tanks. They are then released during the night back to sea - only one in ten will survive.
We took a
walk along Bentota Beach afterwards which is a lovely long stretch of beach but is predominantly occupied by big hotel resorts full of mainly German tourists with local bars called 'wunderbar' and such like! We stopped at one resort to have an overpriced lunch (although not as overpriced as we thought it would be) which had to be vigorously defended from an extremely tame squirrel and then got a bus back to Mirissa just in time to see the clouds to come over.
Other highlight maybe worth a mention is the policy of being given sweets by shopkeepers when they don't have any small change. We haven't yet tried using these sweets to purchase anything so not sure if it works the other way around! In addition to this it is quite amazing how often we have had the exact change in our hands to purchase something. Most items are not priced (and if they are priced are not necessarily sold at that price) and when we enquire with our hands open with some change we nearly always have the right amount - amazing!
So after eleven nights we finally left Mirrisa - a sad day! A short
bus ride to the train station then a one and a half hour seat jerking train ride with a couple of largish cockroaches for company (we were armed and ready with spray) to Hikkaduwa. Hikkaduwa is a much larger resort than Mirissa but not as awful as Unawatuna. Upon arrival against our normal policy we got into a tuk tuk. Not sure if we mentioned but we have been avoiding these scam artists as much as possible as on nearly every occasion they try some lame trick - this time was no different. We asked the driver to take us to the 'Why Not' guesthouse. He attempts to persuade us to try a different guesthouse which is much better of course. We decline and insist on the Why Not. With our guesthouse in sight he pulls as close as he can into a neighbouring and more expensive guesthouse hoping we won't notice the sign and where he will no doubt earn commission. The driver is adamant its the Why Not and when he asks the receptionist he also claims it to be the Why Not despite standing beneath a large sign saying 'Moon Beam'. We simply got out and walked
the rest of the way. As we said - very lame but extremely tiresome.
They had some basic rooms and one wooden cabanna on stilts on the beachfront within spitting distance of the sea - the beach is so narrow however that most places are! We later discovered that lying on the beach loungers was quite a skill in itself as the very narrow beach was also quite steep - you could fall asleep and wake up in the sea! Anyway, back to our room. It was a little indulgent for us (seven pounds) but it was a very 'romantic' room - this romanticism lasted all of five minutes after we found another largish cockroach. Not sure if it was resident or a hitchhiker from the station. Apart from that day was great - beach and restaurant on our doorstep and a table tennis............ table! By the end of the day we were ping pong masters! After dinner and a couple of beers we retired to our room about 9.30pm (very late for us) and no sooner had we entered our room and the floorboards were a shakin'. Stop it now - they were shaking because of the terrible
Baby sea turtle
I'm pretending to eat it I haven't just been bitten! boom, boom. boom from the music downstairs! We checked out the next day as it continued until after 11pm (when did we become so old?) and moved to a place about half a kilometre from the beach in the middle of nowhere.
During this day we visited a tsunami museum which had lots of photographs of the destruction and quite a few of dead bodies. Nearly 31,000 people died in Sri Lanka and there was up to three separate waves in some areas. There were short stories in the museum - one explained that as the sea went out one kilometre before the first wave hit many fishermen went collecting fish flapping on the sand not even thinking what was about to happen! Another story was about a train with 1,500 people on being flooded and cartwheeling four times before coming to a halt. Nearly all those on board died. Very interesting and very moving.
Next day we left Hikkaduwa to catch the six hour train to Kandy (this time cockroach free - must prefer the beach and decided not to come back with us). Before leaving we rang the hotel to re-confirm our booking. We discovered they
were full and had completely forgotten us, although Claire could hear the penny dropping over the phone as she explained who we were. To their credit they were very accommodating (pun intended) and picked us up from the station and took us to the hotel for dinner, drove us to a nearby hotel where we stayed one night and were picked up the following morning to go back for breakfast. A room would be ready when we return from the cricket. The substitute hotel was supposedly more expensive but we were getting the same rate (after some haggling). We were glad to stay only one night as it didn't deserve to be more expensive. Furthermore, it looked as though there had been some function and the guests were still banging drums loudly when we arrived at 11pm. It wasn't as loud as Hikkaduwa and we were tired so it didn't matter.
We walked to the cricket ground with a guy called Alan Davis who is a well travelled England cricket follower and once played for Wycombe Wanderers FC. Continuing our current spending pattern we purchased a ticket for one pound! The seat was in the shade all day and
offered an excellent view, England began Day Three on 186-6 in reply to Sri Lanka's 188. They went on to score 281 and in return Sri Lanka finished on 167-2. During the day the Sri Lankan bowler, Murali, captured his 709th test wicket overtaking Shane Warne as the greatest wicket taker of all time. A really enjoyable day was only hampered by a Sri Lankan guy near us whose sole intention was to entertain the crowd (don't think he watched any cricket). He seemed to be very funny as many people were laughing at him but he didn't stop talking, singing and dancing all afternoon and it became quite weary.
The next day we arrived early and placed ourselves a more comfortable distance from where the guy was to return to. It was a long day for England as Sri Lanka finally declared on 442-8 shortly before close of play after which England managed to lose one wicket for 9 runs. There were two rather unusual delays in play. The first was a stray dog taking a very nonchalent stroll across the length of the field. The second was a swarm of bees - all the players hitting the
deck was a funny sight!
In the morning we purchased a miniature cricket bat hoping to get Monty Panesar to sign it. Claire had an attempt when Monty was fielding near the boundary but couldn't get his attention. She also tried the dressing room but the guard was having none of it so we got 'Slinger Malinga' - an unconventional Sri Lankan bowler - to sign it instead.
Our original intention was to stay for just two days but I was enjoying it so much and Claire almost as much as me I was able to convince her to go back for the morning session before getting a bus to Negombo. The match was also nicely poised with Sri Lanka favourites but England hopeful of a draw. Optimism didn't last long as England had soon lost six wickets and only massed 163 runs by the time we left. While trying to watch our final hour of cricket the Sri Lankan man next to me was interested in our views on various political and current issues such as Diana's death, The Royal Family, Tamil Tigers and Osama Bin Laden. We were quite brief with our answers trying not to
be rude as we just wanted to watch the bloody cricket!
We checked the internet as soon as we arrived in Negombo to discover England had rallied for a while before getting out on 261 and losing by 88 runs - nevermind. It was very windy on the final day and the roof above where many England supporters were sitting got partially blown off. The roof consisted of several corrugated metal sheets which when came crashing down would have caused 'serious injury or death' had they hit anyone. The Sri Lankan officials were agonisingly slow to react and when they did it consisted of a team of four with a ladder throwing the remaining sheets down! On a more positive note I got two more signatures on our bat, one being the greatest wicket taker of all time - Murali - and the other I still haven't worked out who he is!
Our final day in Sri Lanka was largely spent trying to book accommodation for Singapore as everywhere seemed to be full. We eventually had to settle on dormitory style accommodation. In the evening we had dinner with a guy called Derek, who plays cricket for Worcestershire
over 50s, as we had done the previous night as he was on the same bus as us from Kandy and we shared a very cosy tuk tuk ride! Derek if you are reading this - well done!
Well, that's it for Sri Lanka so it's time for the Top 5 again (in descending order of course)!
5 - Mirissa Beach
4 - Anarudhapura
3 - Temple Rock (Sigiriya)
2 - Sri Lanka v England Cricket match in Kandy
1 - Pinnewala Elephant Orphanage - gotta love those elephants!
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Sal & Nick
non-member comment
good tan!
Claire your tan looks great! Can't really see your hair - that is probably the idea from what you have said! This bit sounds like fun - lounging around and getting a tan - much more like it! Can't see anything special about julians expensive hair cut either!!?? Sorry Julian!! Missing you guys!