Sri Lanka

The Blue Lotus is the national flower of Sri Lanka. It's beauty and uniqueness reflect the qualities of the country it represents. Sri Lanka is a country of stunning beauty. It is lush with enchanting beaches, mountains, and people. We spent 2 short days there, recognizing that we will be back for a longer and closer look.
The flight from KL to Columbo is 3 hours. We arrived in Sri Lanka at 7:15am on Friday. Hikkaduwa, our destination, was about 120km south of the airport. In my travel plans that distance would take about 2 hours and I estimated we'd arrive at our hotel by 10:00am. I forgot to take into account we were travelling in a third world country. We arrived dusty and weary about noon. We spent our first day at the beach soaking up the sun, the r and r, and the beauty.

The next day we hired a tuk-tuk driver, Anura, to show us around a bit. We went to Galle to see the largest European fort established in Asia. It is a world heritage site and sits right on the southern tip of Sri Lanka. It was established long before the Europeans came though and was a major trading center for the Chinese, Arabs, Malays, and Indians. The Portugese, Dutch, and English all realized the importance of the fort as center for the spice trade and took turns ruling until the British were finally kicked out in 1947. It was then that the island replaced its colonial name, Ceylon, with Sri Lanka.
After a good look around the old fort and parts of the city we checked out some gem shops. Sri Lanka is renown for gems and so we looked through piles of sapphires, agates, and other precious and semi-precious stones. Weary from this we headed to another beach a little south of Galle for a swim and lunch. The beach at Unawatuna is a little smaller than Hikkaduwa but better for swimming. We spent a couple hours hanging out both on the beach and in the water.
After the beach we tootled on a little bit farther to visit a tea plantation. It was a small operation but specialized in white tea, which is a delicacy. We were the only visitors and we were treated like royalty tasting tea in an old colonial home on the hill overlooking the plantation. We got to see the whole operation. It was a mixed farming affair with a few mango and papaya, as well as rubber trees mixed in among the tea bushes. The machinery they used to dry and crush the leaves was ancient, dating back to the mid 1800's.

It was nice to get to know our driver, Anura. Like most of the folks along the coast he had a sad story to tell about the tsunami. He lost his home and meager possessions when it hit in 2004. Pretty well all the local fishermen and villagers who lost their homes were forced to relocate in land after the tsunami hit. They were told it was too dangerous to go back and it was a condition for aid. It didn't take long however after the locals left for the multinational hotel chains to scoop up the best beaches, after they were cleaned up with aid $$, for development at bargain prices.



This ox and cart was on the streets of Galle. I think this fellow must have delivered those sacks of cement you see in the background. He was rather ripped.


Picking tea at the White Tea Plantation. Apparently the first time a human actually touches white tea has is with the lips when drank. The Chinese emperors had their pickers use gold scissors to harvest. I don't think they had those here. We sampled some and it tasted delicious, smooth but we didn't want to sell our house to buy some. Apparently they get regular orders from Middle Eastern royal families.


The fishermen here are tidying up their nets after a day on the sea. When we watched the sunset and sat on the beach in the evening we could see hundreds of fishing boats out on the ocean. It is called the highway to India as they stretch from the south of Sri Lanka to the Indian coast. Many of these fellows went out in wooden catamarans with one pontoon.

A women selling her mangos on the side of road.

The streets of Galle were full of market scenes like this. Lots of produce and fresh produce for sale.

This snake had Maureen excited. It was scurrying through the newly planted rice field. It was about 4 ft. long. According to Anura it was a harmless one.