For our spring break, I decided I wanted to go some place that I could surf in warm water with no wetsuit. I wanted to be surrounded by palm trees, water and sun. When looking at cheap airfares out of Cairo, Colombo, Sri Lanka kept coming up for just over $500. Some tickets to mainland Europe were more expensive than flying to the large island off India. Sri Lanka, a country that was entwined in a civil war for years, had never really entered my mind as a vacation destination until I noticed the airfare and started checking the surf report. Scotty and I ended up purchasing our tickets on the same day, with Greg and Steve following up a week or two later.
After a connection in Bahrain, we landed in Colombo some time around 4am. Lucky for us, Steve and Greg's flight was delayed, so Scotty and I got to sit in the Colombo airport for 4 or 5 hours with nothing to do. When you think of the Colombo airport arrivals lounge, imagine the show 'Wings', but bigger, surround yourself with a lot of people speaking Sinhalese, forget any type of delicious food and add a TV with one scratchy Sri Lankan news station playing. And watch as family after family cart refrigerators to their waiting vans.
From Colombo we drove through morning rush-hour traffic all the way along the western edge of the country, through Galle and ended up at our hotel near Weligama. We had a nice bungalow on the water, hammocks strewn throughout the grass lawn and a good restaurant that served what had to be at least 32oz beers. From this station, I was lucky enough to go surfing down the road two morning in a row. The waves were nothing spectacular, but they were clean and ridable, and better than anything I've got here in Cairo.
After a couple nights in Weligama we proceeded to Tengalle where we split a large cabana in a wooded area near the beach. The cabana-resort that we stayed in was really nice and clean with a cozy little beach cove with some tiny restaurant/bars. Once again we spent most of our time on the beach, walking up and down the coastline discovering blow-holes, bathing water buffalo, cliff jumping and climbing palm trees. On one random evening, we were appoached by a tour guide with 11 fingers offering to take us to see some sights in the area. We distracted him for a minute, offered a little beer and received a nice insiders opinion on the civil war that had ended but a few years ago.
After a night to think about it, we decided to take the guide up on his offer and planned out an extended trip back to the airport. We were taken to a temple built into and on top of a mountain, a temple where I got to pet an elephant, went to the fort at Galle, had a nice meal on the beach, drank from coconuts and explored the countryside. The decision to take this route to the airport was great, as it rounded out the Sri Lanka experience nicely.
I found the people to be relatively friendly, but always looking to make a buck. Prices were always higher for us than for locals, but that's the same pretty much anywhere you go. The evidence of the tsunami from a few years before was still evident. There were tons of abandoned and destroyed houses and some boats on top of cliffs and way inland. I'd definitely love to go back to Sri Lanka, explore the center of the island, and especially the north east coast where the Tamil Tigers had their last stand. But this trip was just for relaxation, and that's what we got.