A Taste of Sri Lanka

Where to begin?

One of our first trips after "Busy Season 2012" was a long weekend in Colombo,  Sri Lanka in April. We had been to India before so we thought we knew what we were getting into. Generally, yes but Sri Lanka was even more of an adventure than we were prepared for at times!

We found our hotel (Casa Colombo) on Trip Advisor. It is a 200 year old mansion that has 12 converted suites with a modern character of its own. We knew we were in for a treat right when we arrived. The gentlemen at the front desk with a T-shirt, plaid vest and diamond stud earring in one ear introduced himself as Aarun, "our butler," and gave us a card with 3 phone numbers to reach him at if we needed anything at any time.

As our flight arrived around lunch time and as our room was not ready we headed over to the restaurant for some lunch. Melissa played it safe with the seafood medley, but I went hard core with the SIX Sri Lanka curry set. Some were spicy, some were sweet, surprisingly I liked most of them. I mentioned how I liked this dish to Aarun and he said that I should try the Sri Lankan curry breakfast. We were planning on heading out early on a day trip in the morning so I was able to delay that experience...for at least another day.

Glad I had a map to point out where we wanted to go

We spent the rest of the day doing some shopping  around the hotel. We tried to negotiate with the tuk tuk a rate before heading off (like we do in most countries) but quickly noticed that the fare would end up being less than a dollar. I like this place!


The next morning we arranged with the hotel to take us to the inland city of Kandy which is known for its temple and laid back hippie atmosphere. Outside the capital, the roads became less paved very quickly as they winded up the hillsides narrowing down to one lane and literally driving through a hole cut in the base of a huge rock at one point. My neck hurt from constantly turning trying to just take it all in from all the monkeys on the side of the road to the truck carrying an elephant.



Our first stop was a working tea plantation and factory. The main machinery is almost 120 years old brought over by the British. We saw the entire process from sorting, drying, crushing, and bagging.. It was a sweatshop in there, literally and we were not working! After working up a sweat we sat down a had a cup of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) Black Tea.

Last stop before Kandy was a huge park. It must have been take school kids to the park day as it was packed with school kids of all ages wearing white uniforms running wild. There are huge hundred plus year old trees with sprawling exposed roots and extended branches. After looking up at the branches for awhile I realized there are thousands of huge bats hanging from the branches. As it was daytime, they were not very active, but Melissa was could not move fast enough. The animals were not done with her yet, just as we hit the clearing a troop of monkeys ran down the main path.

Upon arriving in Kandy, the driver informed me that I would need to rent a wrap as I was wearing shorts and needed to cover up to enter the temple. Fine, I have to cover up in Thailand when wearing shorts too.

Melissa standing in line at the temple 

There was a large group of school children arriving at the same time as us. Some of them came up to me and asked me why I was wearing the wrap. I knew I looked stupid, now I felt stupid! Oh well..

They were very intrigued with us. I don't think we saw a single other Westerner the whole time we were in Kandy. One of the kids even came up to Melissa and gave her one of his flower offerings.

The ride back was down right scary! It was a few hours drive back to Colombo and it started to rain just as it was getting dark. Not a big deal for us, but when you add unpaved roads, heavy rain at times, people, monkeys and stray dogs running across the street, and the lack of street lights.. I was really worried. As most of the vehicles on the road were tuk tuks, our driver would go into oncoming traffic to pass the slower vehicles. One time I vividly remember looking up just as he was doing one of these nail bitting maneuvers. I saw the single headlight heading straight for us and discounting it as a tuk tuk..but quickly found out it was a huge 18 wheeler with only one working headlight. At that point we buckled up and closed our eyes. This lasted for over 3 hours thanks to the rain!  Upon arriving back at the hotel Aarun asked us how it was and if we wanted to "make a plan for tomorrow?"... um no more cars until it's time to head back to the airport!

The next morning the waiter for breakfast smiles and asks me, Sri Lankan breakfast? Sure why not. Melissa stuck with the fruit tray with pastries, smart move. First came out half a dozen "hoppers" these fist sized thin bland pancakes, wich one of them had a sunny side egg sitting there. Next came 4 Sri Lankan curries for you to spoon into the hoppers, like the lunch.. exactly like lunch some were spicy some were sweet with coconut shavings. No, I would not order it again, but it was an interesting experience.

 After breakfast we took a tuk tuk to the downtown area and walked around.  There were lots of boarded up colonial buildings established in the mid to late 1800s. They were all run down but you could tell it was the old high street (shopping street).. it must have impressive in its heyday.

With all that walking around we worked up an appetite. We came across a muslim restaurant that had a large glass display with fried things and if that was not enough they had a (cold!) Coke sign..done!

Inside we found some plastic stools near the kitchen. We ordered our drinks and asked for a few specific of the items from the display. The next thing we know, we had a HUGE plate full of everything, we looked at each other and thought we just got had.  But, as it turns out, they just put everything in front of you and you just pay for what you eat.  Needless to say it hit the spot! Just as the dark clouds rolled in we jumped in a tuk tuk and headed back for the hotel.

After arriving back from our downtown run about we sat down in the lobby for a cup of  Ceylon Silver Tips Tea in the lobby. Aarun explained that it is very different than regular teas as it is the picked buds of the ends of tea plants grown in high altitude.  We have never been tea people but it was so good we picked some up in duty free on our way home.