Sari taxi's at your service

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Lucy’s story: It was March 25th, the morning of Alex’s arrival and the clock had not even struck 3:30pm. I woke up bleary eyed, wrapped my sari around me, arranged my hair, and strung purple beads around my neck. After taking tea with my driver we headed to the airport, a short trip from my guesthouse, the Pearl in Negambo. I waited patiently in the arrival lounge with butterflies in my stomach, stood with many curious eyes gazing at me; I remained poised in my traditional Kandian dress until he emerged from the steady trickle of new arrivals. Looking remarkably fresh he cautiously hugged me so not to offend anyone and we scuttled back to the Pearl.

Since March we have travelled extensively from South to east coast, briefly stopping in the hill country. Our trip so far has included some very strange and funny experiences mainly involving our guesthouses, including being peed on by a monkey (in dirty protest) who was perched in the rafters of our tree house in Aragum Bay and returning back to our penthouse suite (meant in sarcasm) in Hikkaduwa only to be greeted by a giant rat swimming in 6 inches of water, both experiences resulted in futile squabbles between me and Alex. The most peaceful experience was walking amongst the tea plantations in Haputale. I imagine heaven would look like this, and I certainty want an endless supply of tea up there in heaven!!!

Alex’s story: I arrived in the cool terminal building of Colombo International airport, wide awake and ready to go. It was 04:30 local time. After meeting Lucy, we went to get the taxi back to Negambo and as we stepped outside the wall of humidity stopped me in my tracks. After 4-5 weeks it still takes some getting used to. So Negambo was a nice introduction to Sinhalese life, the majority of the local population is catholic and is descendents from the Portuguese. After an eventful time up the mid north we headed for the more recogniseable south west coast, with miles and miles of tropical beaches hemmed in by a backdrop of thick palm jungle. We finally found ourselves bound for ‘upcountry’ via a national park for a safari. Travel in this part of the world needs immense mental strength and incredible patience, as even the easiest travel plans can go wrong. We now find ourselves in A-Bay (Aragua) an old hippie surfer hangout out on the east. It has a different feel from the rest of Sri Lanka so far, with a mainly Tamil Muslim population. I think more than anywhere we are likely to go, the recent troubles are closer to the surface here than the other towns, that said we have met a lot of nice people here.

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