A Few Days In Sri Lanka

Every time we go to India we say we'll visit another country as the flights are cheap. And every time we run out of time to do this! But this time we specifically left out time to visit Sri Lanka, as it is so close to India and is really easy to get to- just a 3 hour flight from Kolkata to Colombo!

When we landed in Colombo we were met by our driver Sunny, who is potentially one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. After a couple of hours being in Sri Lanka we saw that Sri Lankan people in general are SO lovely and hospitable. We also saw that the country is full of natural beauty and is really clean (in contrast to India where we’d just come from). The only bad impression we had was the traffic, which was awful and it took us around 3.5 hours to drive to Kandy. By the time we arrived it was night so we went straight to sleep.

The next day was spent exploring Kandy- but not for me. Food poisoning struck and so I was stuck in the hotel eating plain toast (cri). So I can't really tell you about Kandy. But I was feeling a lot better in the afternoon after the antibiotics kicked in, so we drove to Sigiriya, and on the way stopped at the Lackgrove Spice Garden. This was an amazing experience - they showed us so many different herbs and spice plants, told us about Ayurvedic medicine (they have a Ayurvedic medicine training centre there) and the students even gave us some massages and a cup of spiced tea, which was just what I needed after so long in the car. 

Our hotel was the Fresco Water Villa which was gorgeous, with a pool and everything. The only annoying thing is was that there was no wifi in the rooms, only in the lounge so you had to walk outside whenever you wanted the wifi. But we weren’t at the villa that much so it wasn’t a huge problem.

The next morning after breakfast (which surprisingly consisted of hashbrowns and bacon) we drove to Sigiriya rock- we wanted to climb up but it was 1000 steps and I was still pretty sick so we passed, and learnt about the history at the rock museum instead. There were monkeys everywhere which were so cute. We then drove to Anuradhapura, 2.5 hours away to see a Buddhist cave temple. We stopped to feed some elephants and eat some king coconuts (which are bright orange and native to Sri Lanka) on the way, which were both amazing experiences! You first drink the water from the coconuts and then crack them open to eat the coconut inside. 

In the afternoon we drove to Dambulla where we visited a cave temple. It took a while to climb up, especially in the heat, but the views were so worth it and the temples were amazing.

The next day we drove back to Colombo, the capital city, to explore there for the day before our flight back to India. On the way we stopped for a drink and saw a snake whisperer which was pretty cool. Colombo is the capital city, with beaches as well. We saw the main monuments and spent a couple of hours by the beach before heading to the hotel. 

I absolutely fell in love with Sri Lanka- and we didn’t even see half of it! I wish I wasn’t so ill and could’ve enjoyed it more and tried more of the local cuisine. But if there’s one thing I know for sure is that I’ll definitely be back.