A large, bare bedroom, in a house with high ceilings, wooden frames and battered fans affixed to walls with a short pull-string switch. The room is spacious and clean, but unmistakenly modest. A fine layer of dust settles a chest of drawers sculpted from dark teak wood. The floor is tiled in a shade of egg shell white ceramic, in keeping with the spartan aesthetic. The bed has plain, white sheets, stiff and starchy to the touch. A mosquito net drapes all around the bed, softening the neatly cut edges of tightly pulled bed linens. The air is still and thick, and unrelentlessly humid. It’s quiet, except for the low whirr of the fan.

And so, to Sri Lanka – formerly known as the Kingdom of Ceylon (pronounced si-LON which I NEVER knew) back when the British were all up in their face.

Having read Michael Ondaatje’s semi fictionalised memoirs Running in the Family, book (he, of The English Patient authoring fame), the above describes the lingering image of the ‘Sri Lanka’ that I envisaged before my trip. It’s a reassuring, comforting image (I suppose now I can even call it a memory), like a warm hug. Now, alongside this, it’s another scene- the endless horizon of green hills and countless rows of tea terraces, that summarises my experience of this beautfiful country. I can still smell the tea..

It could be worth mentioning (at least, to my future self) that this is a habit of reading about a country prior to one’s trip is something I wanted to get into after picking up a copy of Edward Zwick’s The Joy of Travel. In it, Zwick suggests a way to truly immerse yourself in the culture of a country, is to pick up a book about the place written by a local, who can not only feel but also brilliantly describe their country or city in such a way that you feel like you’re living it already. Reading Zwick’s book itself – or even the first chapter – brought out in me an excitement that had me opening up another draft blog post, only this one wasn’t fixated on any particular travel memory, but on my own joy of travel – building on what Zwick said and applying it to my own beliefs and convictions. In the same way he had suggested reading a book by a local author as a means to understand the country, reading his book helped me understand why we, or I, loved so much to travel. One day, I’ll ride on another gust of enthusiasm and inspiration and finish that blog post.

Elephants and Douchebags

Our first stop immediately upon landing safe and sound at Colombo airport, was the Elephant Orphanage. I wasn’t particularly itching to see it, but apparently it’s more or less right there between Colombo Airport and Pidurangala, and a pretty well known tourist pit-stop for the sake of “just coz”.

The driver who picked us up with relatively young, disinterested, and definitely not the guy who I had been conversing with on email. Apparently, Harsha (well-rated driver who I had spoken to) was not available to do the airport pick up so he sent this dude. Ok, I’m pretty sure this is exactly why people don’t pick other drivers, because err, I did my research and wanted to go with a particular guy. Fine. Though that turned out to be the first warning sign of what turned out to be a pretty crappy driver experience throughout Sri Lanka.

In any case, this guy, started off badly himself by telling us in assured terms that he knew a better place to see the Elephants and we can go there. Er no thanks, can we stick to the itinerary I spent twenty emails conversing on? After some initial faff, we got him to make a phone call to Harsha and he begrudgingly agreed to not be a total douche, by driving us to where we had agreed. In the car, he played an interesting diverse mix of local Sri Lankan folk music and Four Non Blondes, and stopped by a gas station where he casually puffed on his cigarette, standing next to the gas attendant filling up the tank. Sitting on the side of the passenger seat next to the gas tank, I at least assured myself of a quick, imminent end, should my death come at the hands of a douchebag driver.

When we finally arrived at the Elephant Orphanage, it was time for their bath time. At this time, dozens of elephants (chained at the feet, which I have mixed feelings about) trudge a short distance from the enclosed Orphanage to the river’s edge and basically have a bit of a splash about.

We had lunch, and watched the Elephants cool and spray themselves down at the water’s edge. I took a few photographs with my brand spanking new Olympus camera, against a backdrop of what was my first proper view of lush, green Sri Lanka. Grass, trees, fields and plantations for miles and miles, would very much be the endearing image for the next few days.

Sadly, there’s only so many ways one can take a photo of an Elephant. Our initial objective for Day 1 was merely to get close to Pidurangala, so that we could climb the rock in time for Sunrise the next day. As is the norm when one holidays in Sri Lanka, we had booked into staying at a few homestays, which offered a good combination of authenticity, location and value for money. They were all clean, decent and offering a hearty Sri Lankan breakfast ( I recalled many lentils, much fruit, and occasionally a pancake. I was also introduced to ‘sambol’ a heavenly concoction of coconut chilli and diced red onion. Oh, condiments, be still, my savoury heart. ). The homestays would also save us a few pennies for the decadence reserved at the end of our trip. At the end of that first day, I was glad to be rid of douchebag driver, and had been assured that normal duties would be resumed and that Harsha would come pick us up in the morning.

Siguriya and Pidurangula – Climbing big rocks, to see bigger rocks

Having agreed a pick-up time of 5:00am, at 5:07am he was nowhere to be seen. Some difficulties with finding the obscure homestay, perhaps, but already we were not amused. A few minutes later, we saw headlights flash in the distance and all was forgiven. That is, until we saw that the passenger seats were not empty. Apparently, Harsha was also escorting another couple of folks around Sri Lanka, and they too wanted to climb the rock today. Er, what? What are we, just tourist hot-potatoes? And you, Mr Private Driver, Sir – given you cater to several different customers simultaneously, do you have magical teleportation powers accompanied with the ability to bend space and time? At this point though, we were like – whatever, we’ll ask questions afterwards, we’re late enough as it is.

Thanks to all that mess, we had gotten to the rock later than we had expected, and we needed to haul ass in order to mitigate FOMO and get a good seat at the top for sunrise. A thirty minute climb, with twenty minutes to do it in. Nothing Katie likes better than hiking, in a rush. Admittedly, the short climb wasn’t so much strenuous as tedious. Many steep steps, amidst a flurry of eager tourists scrabbling like ants in a line up towards the top, all wanting/needing to keep pace with the next guy.

The final stretch resembled a mini obstacle course, with some mild contortion of limbs and torsos to scramble up a couple of boulders to the top. I surprised myself at my ability..next up, American Ninja Warrior. When I finally pulled myself up to take in the view, it came to my attention that it was actually a rather murky grey morning, so it became rather redundant whether we made it for sunrise or not. I was however, very pleasantly surprised. If only all tiny hikes lead to such rewards. The platform was huge, totally open and with a completely un-obscured 360 view. Lakes and vast, vast plains as far as the eye could see – beyond the horizon. There was also that much anticipated view of the famous Sigiriya Rock sleepily nestled amongst all the greenery.

I happily plodded around that rock for quite some time. Partly because it was so pleasant and liberating to do so, as I walked to each corner of the massive platform to take in every degree of the view, and partly because I really didn’t wanna go down all those steps.

When we arrived back at the car, Harsha was waiting and the other tourists we had rode with were nowhere to be seen. We were already suitably suspicious about the extent to which our driver had intended to bundle all his tourists together in a one-size-fits all deal. After a few quizzical (though half-hearted) moments of him looking around for aforementioned absent tourists, he gestured for us to get in and be on our way. On one hand, see ya suckers, make your own way back. On the other hand, I really hoped they write a shitty trip-advisor review for him.

After a breakfast of bread, daal, fruits and a sort of sambal jam (loved it), we headed to a Spice garden, where I learnt a great deal of surprisingly useful stuff which I have now promptly forgotten entirely. The guy who showed us around could well have been Italian in other life – he gesticulated wildly and was clearly incredibly passionate about spices and herbs. Or maybe incredibly passionate about getting tipped, one can’t say. All I knew was that he spent a great deal of time staring at our chests. Admittedly (or was it conveniently), it was when he was describing how certain herbs were great for chesty coughs, asthma, lungs, or anything that was remotely related to the chest region. Lucky there were so many miracle cures for chest-related ailments. A couple of tit-bits (I can’t even tell whether I did that Freudian-ly..) we learnt were that simply biting on clove is good for toothache, and that western medicine focused on inhibiting the symptoms, but Asian medicine targets the root cause. Drinking/eating/bathing in tumeric, garlic, ginger, cardamom and the like will ultimately heal your varicose veins, haemorroids, aches, pains and hairiness. It’ll just take many weeks, months and patience to do so.

The entire tour was pretty full on. So you can imagine the awkwardness when we ended the tour, absent-mindedly shuffled around the shop, and made a run for it empty handed when he wasn’t looking.

Kandy: Overwhelming tea-scapes and underwhelming train rides

As far as your mortal eyes may squint – rolling, undulating hills of lusciously green tea plantations. Fresh tea leaves reaching and basking in the lazy sunshine, with the familiar scent of your morning cuppa wafting through the air. We had been half-heartedly taken through the tea factory first, where various stages of crushing, mulching, tumble drying had been pointed out to us. Many tourists took out their cameras at the sight of these grim tired machines churning out sticks and leaves. As vaguely interesting as it was, I personally couldn’t envisage any situation where I’d want to whip out my Google Photos and reminisce on these brutal, mechanized vats. No, after the obligatory tour and complimentary cup of black tea (it was perfectly fine but I’d be lying if I said it rocked my world), it was out to the fields to fetch the money-shots.

Granted, the land was not bursting with a kaleidoscope of colours, but I was humbled by the sight of it all nonetheless. Day 4- Little Adam’s Peak hike to little adams peak, other sight seeing at Ella, drive and stay nearby Yala (perhaps at Tissa) Luckily, there were a couple of enjoyable short hikes around Ella that we could easily partake in. Little Adam’s Peak for example, was mildly sweaty, but simple, and essentially great value (Views/physical exertion = Value gained, obviously). Also, it was around this time when we realised that Mungo the driver, whilst competent on the roads – was totally oblivious as to our prescribed itinerary, having assumed we were finishing our tour in Tissa as opposed to Galle a day or two later. Admittedly this was both his failing, and that of Harsha – his son, the guy who we had been corresponding with prior to the trip, and the idiot who thought he could be clever and juggle his customers by fobbing them off to anyone with a car and free time on their hands. Throughout his ‘stay’ with us, he was disinterested, completely oblivious to exactly what our plans were (despite me giving his son a BULLET POINTED email of dates and destinations), and, as it turned out at the end of the trip – demanding of accommodation expenses which were way above the agreed price and on some nights, more expensive than our own accommodation. I ended up having to message and call his daughter in law and argue against the outrage and only managed to reach a mutual number when Aini and I agreed to pretend we only had a finite amount of cash on us (through broken, nursery school levels of Cantonese). That was a fraught, utterly disappointing and yet appropriate end to a great holiday with an utterly shit driver. Anyway, enough of that. He got us in one piece to the eventual destinations so there’s something to be said for that. An endless view of rolling terraced hills sprouting your favourite brew

Yala Safari

I’ve never been on Safari before – that is unless you count the Singapore Night Safari, and that sorta sounds like cheating. Touring Yalla National Park was pretty fun, as it would be riding in a bumpy 4×4 , wind batting across your face, with all the day’s sand and dust accumulating in your hair and orifices (it sounds sarcastic, but no I actually liked the experience). As for the animals, we got excited whenever we spotted a wild boar nibbling away at a branch with its arse facing us, or a herd of elephants drinking from a lake 200m away. We spotted monkeys, birds, and even a rare bear sighting. It was only after I looked at my pictures on the way back and thought actually, these sightings weren’t THAT astonishing. The whole thing was enjoyable enough though. I think a lot of safari appeal comes from the bingo-style hunting of such rare sights. I mean, we don’t do anything special to earn it more then the next tour group, but there’s something very satisfying about it – like some higher power favoured you on this particular day, and graciously allowed you to take a massively blurry and pixellated picture of a moving furry blob from far far away, because this doesn’t happen everyday (or so they tell us), and therefore you are lucky and special and all things wonderful and unique.

Our last destination was Galle, and whilst the spitting rain and grey clouds undoubtedly played their part, I have to admit I was somewhat underwhelmed. Somehow I had gotten the impression it was this utterly charming colonial little town which was an unmissable part of any Sri Lanken road trip. In reality, I’d categorise it as ‘definitely drop by if it’s sorta on the way, but don’t move Heaven and Earth to get there k’. I guess i’ve also been spoilt having visited a host of sites ostensibly labelling themselves as ‘charming’ or ‘quaint little colonial towns’, that really my benchmark has gone up and it has to be really f-cking something to qualify. I’m talking the cobbliest of roads, the thatchiest roofed houses, and a traditional horse-drawn carriageled by a robed shadowy character in a top hat, clip-clopping down the midnight lane, backlit by an array of Victorian-era street lamps. It would be a rather anachronistically trippy scene, but hey it’d be f-ucking quaint. Galle had very few of these – and outside of taking a few pictures of odd juxtapositions like a red letter box outside one of the many white-washed buildings, a couple hours strolling around was just about right for me.

Should you visit Sri Lanka? The conclusion is – yes, absolutely you must go. It is a beautiful country, and with today’s typical lifestyles, a real treat/respite for the eyes to be seeing so much green and natural wonder. Sleep in the homestays – they’re cheap, the breakfasts are plentiful and delicious and the hosts are always so lovely. That train ride? It’s OK, but you honestly won’t be missing out on anything too amazing, other than a picture of a train carriage crawling and snaking around hillsides. Take a driver? Yes it’s a great idea, just as long as it’s anyone but ours.