Trip with Wayne and Delcie

sri_lanka
Originally uploaded by Rob@SFU.

Trip around the south…

As many of you know Cher’s parents came for a short visit. We took advantage of a Poya weekend and a day off work and went on a long road trip. We started Friday afternoon and headed south. We stopped in Kalutara where Cher and I have stayed a few times to drop off a wedding gift for our friend Sanka and it was pouring rain. The roads were flooded and we got soaked just getting in and out of the van to drop off the gift. I was a little worried as I got bit by a few mozzies in the few minutes we were out and this is where Sanka got Dengue fever a few weeks ago. We headed to Bentota and started to look for a room, we stopped at a few hotels and they were either musty or full of mildew or wanted a couple hundred dollars a night. We eventually found a place that nice and wasn’t dirty. As we were parking I saw an elephant walking down the street carrying a load of branches so I grabbed Delcie and Wayne and they saw their first Sri Lankan Elephant working. The next day we went for a long walk in the morning sun along the beach. It was really nice and we saw an elephant carrying a couple off to get married down the beach, it was rather pleasant. After breakfast and another walk and then a sea bath (where I was stung by jelly fish – ouch!) we headed south again. We were planning on staying in Unawatuna where I stayed with Denis back in early July but the hotels were rather full and the “Beach Resort” was more like a hostel that would have been fine if we were backpacking and didn’t mind eating from a kitchen full of rats, cockroaches and other crawleys…. After walking along and looking at some other places we decided to continue on south. We ended up in Tangalle(a) and thought we had found a nice place called the Eva Resort. After showing us a few rooms we were quite happy and I asked how much they wanted for the night. With our residency permits they still wanted $170.00 a night for each room. I argued that this was outrageous for where/what it was and we left. We quickly wondered if this was a mistake as the rest of the places within 20 miles were all either full or not as good as sleeping in the van! We ended up staying in what the Lonely Planet describes as a “monstrosity” of a building. It was a concrete “boat” hotel (botel??) that was very strange. We were the only guests in a 100 room hotel and the view was incredible, it was just an eerie place (see photos). We went for a short walk the next morning and could see lots of tsunami damage and met a nice family on the beach. There was another family who had turned one of the boats destroyed by the tsunami into their residence on the beach. I was taking photos of it when I realized it was now a home. We left Tangalle and headed for the east coast and Arugam Bay. On the drive we saw monkeys and water buffalos and then a couple of wild elephants. Wayne jumped out of the van and was taking photos while I was filming from the safety of the van. He started to get closer to them when we realized he likely didn’t know they often kill people so we called him back in to the van. Delcie was trying to call the insurance agency to see if he’d be covered but couldn’t get a cell signal.. just kidding Wayne :-) We finally made it to Arugam Bay and shocked our driver by accepting the first room we stopped to see. After the Tangalle incident I think he thought we would look at every hotel in Arugam Bay before settling on none and having to drive through the night to another city…. The beach was incredible but the whole town had a very sad feeling to it. There were soldiers on the beach going from fishing boat to fishing boat collecting their “tax” I suppose. In the end they had a whole sack of fish. We headed for Nuwara Eliya and this was an incredible drive. We left the coast and headed back into Hill country which is where all the tea is grown. It was raining and dark when we arrived at the Grand Hotel. It was a bit expensive but well worth the stay, an incredible hotel built by the British in the late 1800’s. It was just incredible and so cold we needed the fireplace in our bedroom! The next morning in the sunshine we all went for a walk through the plantations up into the hills. It was so nice to only hear the wind and smell fresh air. We headed back to Colombo and had an enjoyable drive through the tea plantations and past spectacular waterfalls.

. It was a great trip and we only had to drive on the same road for a short distance between Arugam Bay and Nuwara Eliya. An incredible trip!! See the rest of the photos on my Flickr site…. Rob