My route through Sri Lanka looked something like this:
Sri Lanka’s a great option for those of you who can only take two or three weeks off at a time due to work commitments. Its very easy to get around the island and tourism infrastructure is well-developed. The people are kind and helpful as well, so it won’t be a stressful getaway from the office. My route below is just a starting point for your Sri Lankan trip planning.
I felt like I managed to see everything I wanted to see without feeling rushed. Ending my trip in Mirissa in the south was a good decision – I spent a few days here unwinding by the beach, surfing, reading, eating delicious fresh food… I’d recommend it!
Days 1-2 Negombo/Colombo – BEWARE SCAMS!!
You’ll probably fly into Negombo (Bandaranaike International Airport) – there’s not much to see here. Get on one of the regular buses just outside the airport terminal that will take you into the city. It shouldn’t cost more than $5. I took an express bus and there were no stops at all. My mum arrived a few hours before me and ended up on the local red bus (I think it could have been no.187). It was a lot more packed, a similar price, and to top it all off, her wallet was stolen as she was getting off the bus. When she went to the police, they showed her a picture of a woman and asked if she recognised her. I think it’s quite a common scam for groups of thieves to work together on the buses so just keep your wits about you.
I also had a strange experience on my journey from Negombo to Colombo. I knew I was in for an interesting ride from the very beginning. The coach was entirely empty. An older man in his 40s came on and made a beeline straight for the seat next to me. This was straight after an annoying airport experience (more about it in this post) I’d just had over in Kochi, India, so I was not really in the mood for another long conversation with a stranger who may or may not have my best interests at heart. This man kept insisting that he could drive me around Sri Lanka, entirely free, that he could come to my hotel tomorrow morning first thing, collect me, take me to every place I wanted to visit, it would be a fun experience, he’s a Buddhist, I wouldn’t have to pay at all, he just wants to do it because he is a religious man, etc. etc. I could hardly get a word in sideways.
Oh, another weird thing. He asked for some water so I gave him my opened water bottle and he put his mouth on the bottle neck and sucked the water out so loudly I could almost see the backwash going back inside. He handed it back to me but I said he could keep it.
Anyway, I told him what he was offering was very kind but I was going to meet my mother at the hotel and I couldn’t make plans without her. Needless to say, he kept persisting, to the point where he was asking for the exact address of where I was staying and saying that he was going to be there the next morning. After a very long ride into Colombo (it was about 40 minutes of this back and forth) we arrived and I hastily got off the coach, thanking him and making a speedy exit. I thought I’d lost him in the crowd of people at the market we’d stopped at but he reappeared as I was getting into a tuktuk, asking if I wanted to go and get something to eat before I went to my hotel. I said no thanks, I need to meet my mother now, and that was the last I saw of him.
This was probably another scam, although I’m not quite sure who would have fallen for it. He was sooo incredibly insistent with offering his services, ‘for free’, it set all sorts of alarm bells ringing.
Colombo seemed to have a very high number of unscrupulous people looking for hapless tourists to make a quick rupee out of. My mother and I were approached by four or five people in our two days in Colombo, trying to force us to let them take us to a gem exhibition. One man introduced himself to us as we were crossing the road, pretending to be friendly and pointing out his ‘car’ up ahead in a bid to prove himself as a businessman on a lunch break. He then suggested we go to a gem exhibition and pointed at a tuktuk conveniently parked up right at the crossing, saying that he could tell the driver where to take us. When we politely said we already had plans, he started getting really angry and raising his voice, actually shouting at us until we ducked into a nearby cafe for cover.
Thankfully, once outside Colombo, everything in Sri Lanka was so peaceful, relaxed and beautiful. I wouldn’t recommend spending much time in Colombo at all if you can help it.
2-5 Dambulla, Polonnaruwa, Sigiriya
If you stay at either of these places, you can easily get to the other two in a hired car and it saves you the hassle of checking in/out three times. We realised, too late, that this is what we should have done. Fortunately for the purposes of this post, we have three hotels to recommend instead of just one (although it would probably be best to stay in Sigiriya or Dambulla).
Dambulla
We visited the Dambulla Cave Temple here, a World Heritage site. It was definitely worth a visit. There are several temples carved into the rock with hundreds of Buddha statues. The caves are really beautiful and it’s amazing how well the colours have been preserved.
Sigiriya
Site of the eponymous Sigiriya Rock (Lion Rock). The actual rock and ancient citadel is a must-climb. There are many many tourists here, and monkeys, but it’s still something you can’t miss.
However, my personal favourite in Sigiriya was climbing the Pidurangala rock, a few kilometres to the north of Sigiriya. There was nobody else there when my mother and I climbed it. There are some bits where you really have to do a bit of bouldering and scramble up, as well as squeeze through some tight crevices, which makes the trek up pretty fun and interesting. When you get to the top (be careful – the wind is very strong up here), you can see Sigiriya rock, standing out in a very flat and lush green landscape. It’s so beautiful.
Polonnaruwa
Polonnaruwa, another World Heritage site, was an ancient city that was once the capital of Sri Lanka. It’s famed for its exemplary urban planning and the state of its conservation. If you’re not an urban planning enthusiast or an archaeologist, it’s still interesting to explore, as long as you’re stocked up with adequate food and water supplies. You can rent bicycles to cycle around as it’s a very large complex. Beware of the heat – we cycled around for ages and I almost got heatstroke. Just had to get an emergency coconut to rehydrate (any excuse for a fresh coco, yum). If you’re short on time and choosing between the above three places, I’d say you could skip Polonnaruwa in favour of the other two.
Accommodation
My mother and I stayed at Saga Heritage Accommodation in Sigiriya. We were the only guests at the time and the manager, Ananda, was so incredibly friendly and kind. He picked fruits for us from the garden to try and said he wanted to set his own hotel up in Kandy, his hometown. The villa was clean and comfortable and the food was delicious (a common theme throughout my Sri Lanka trip).
In the afternoon we had a walk around the neighbouring fields and met some very sweet brothers, aged between 6 and 12, who showed us around their family’s fields. They were so adorable and cheeky. We met their uncle too, who told us about the difficulties of having wild elephants as neighbours. They ruin such a large proportion of the crops in the field, through their trampling and eating. The boys showed us a massive heap of elephant dung that had been left behind a few nights beforehand. Until this point, I’d always thought of elephants as amazing, mystical beings, rather than as creators of destruction that farmers in so many parts of the world have to deal with! My mum looked for some sweets to give the boys but she only had chewing gum. They seemed very happy with that though, chewing enthusiastically as we said our goodbyes and headed back to the hotel.
If you stay long enough at Saga Heritage Accommodation, and if you’re lucky, the elephants sometimes come extremely close to the hotel as they make their way to the lake nearby, and you can see them from the veranda.
A double room with breakfast included was $50/night. Highly recommended!
We also stayed at Dignity Villa, Dambulla. The owner here used to be a professional chef, so our dinner out in the garden was absolutely divine. My tastebuds are salivating just thinking about it all again. The room was clean and comfortable and there was a mosquito net and air conditioning. This only cost us $30/night (dinner is an extra 650-850 rupees each) but the food was so incredible.
Our third stay in this area was at Seyara Holiday Resort, Polonnaruwa. There was a swimming pool and you can rent bikes. We ate out this time so can’t comment on dinner offerings. Breakfast was quite average though. A solid option if you want to stay in Polonnaruwa.
5-8 Ella
In Ella, a beautifully green and hilly region where Ceylon tea grows, we spent an active three days. See my post on what to do in Ella for more inspiration.
We stayed at Cascade Vally the first few nights which was a little out of town and down a very steep and treacherous track (our brave tuktuk driver pushed through and we all came out unscathed). It was run by a kind couple, Jack and Ramani and the view from the rooms is of the tea bush covered hills beyond.
On our final night, we stayed closer to Ella railway station at Tunnel Gap Homestay. Also highly recommended, and they have an adorable collection of fluffy pets to play with! Including a very cute German Shepherd puppy.
At this point my mum took the train from Ella back to Colombo and I went further down south.
8-13 Mirissa, Galle
Stay in Mirissa and make a day trip to Galle. I explored Galle for the best part of three hours with a Belgian friend from the hostel. There’s really not an incredible amount to see here and we both decided unanimously to make our way back to Mirissa before sunset. It’s only about an hour away on one of the regular buses that go through Mirissa so transport to/fro is easy.
Mirissa had a great beach and one of the best hostels I’ve stayed at during my travels. Hangover Hostels, Mirissa (forgive the name) is made from shipping containers and everyone I met there ended up extending their stays. Some had even been there for a month or two. I also extended my stay by a few days, it was in such a good location and the vibes at the hostel were laidback but friendly. Every morning we’d take a bus from outside the hostel to the neighbouring beach of Weligama and do some surfing. You can rent boards for about $5 a day. The actual hostel costs around $12/night and only a narrow two-lane road separates you from the beach and the sea. I even dropped my phone in the sea (completely submerged it), and surprisingly, it continued working. There must be something miraculous in the water.
13-14 Colombo/Negombo
On my return trip back to the airport, I minimised time spent in Colombo by getting straight on a bus headed to Negombo once I got into the city. If you’re coming from Mirissa, you need to take a bus back to Matara, then change onto a bus headed for Colombo at the main bus terminal. I then flagged down a minibus at Bastian Mawatha station that was going in the direction of Negombo, made more mini by the fact that the conductor had squeezed an extra 15 people on a vehicle with only 25 seatbelts. The upside is that you’re completely safe in the case of a sudden emergency stop, as there is no physical way your body can move into any other space. You also need to be certain of where you’re getting off if you’re on a minibus with no set stops. You’ll be fine if you just give the conductor the name of a big junction at the start. He’ll probably remember to call you as everyone else on the bus knows what they’re doing. That being said, it’s worth keeping an eye out on that little blue dot in your maps.
My flight was the next day so I checked into the Hangover Hostel in Negombo, which was empty, as nobody goes to Negombo for fun. I went out and bought some roti and dhal back for dinner. The manager asked me what I was eating, and, already a little confused, I told him I was eating dhal. He looked really blank so I repeated it twice more, “Dal? Dall?”, thinking there was a problem with my pronunciation.
“And what’s that?”
“It’s a really tasty lentil curry that they eat all the time here.”
If you’ve ever been to any country in South Asia, you’ll understand how shocked I was that the manager of the hostel in this small Sri Lankan town had no idea what dhal was. I’d basically had it every single day for the past two months (I was in India beforehand). Cut me open, I’d bleed dhal.
Anyway as it transpires, he was from Quebec, Canada, and it was only his second day on the job, which explains a little.
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