Mirissa 18.02-21.02
After our stay at the beach cabanas, we headed west along the coast to a small beach town called Mirissa. It was our first experience on a Sri Lankan bus! Our first of two drivers was a young guy who thought he was driving a Ferrari. He played loud reggae music through a large boom box in the front of the bus and sped his way down the roads near missing motorbikes and pedestrians! Once reaching Mirissa we checked into our new home from 4 nights called Secret Root. We were really pleased with the accommodation, in hindsight it may have been the highlight of our time in Mirissa! The rooms were large and clean and there was loads of nice seating on the veranda around the small hotel. We spent most of the time chilling on the beach. Coming from Marakolliya beach, Mirissa was far busier and the beach was dotted with pretty tacky restaurants which served bad food. It wasn't quite as idyllic but having said that you could swim in the sea at Mirissa whereas in Marakolliya you couldn't, so that made a nice change. Ed was a water baby for the four days and really enjoyed being able to go in the sea. The waves were pretty rough though, paddling wasn't really an option, you had to just stand, wait for the wave, get knocked over by the wave and then get back up again. Third day in, tragedy struck. Whilst in the sea, Ed was confidently taking on the stronger deeper waves, jumping over and diving under, when suddenly a wave took him unawares. Don't worry Ed himself was unscathed... but I wish I could say the same for his -3 prescription goggles. Alas I can't. In one swift wave motion, his favourite goggles were swiped from his head, never to be seen again. I scanned the coast line many times that day but it seems that they are now with the sea, or some lucky person who also has a -3 prescription. One evening we thought we'd try and download a film to watch from Itunes, we chose the very romantic 'American Gangster', we basically just fancied watching a film with Denzel. However, we significantly overestimated the power of Sri Lankan internet. Last time I checked the movie still had 240,000 minutes left until completed download. Perhaps we'll watch it in August some time....
N
Galle 22.02-23.02
We jumped on a bus along the coast again and made our way to Galle. Galle is a reasonably large coastal city (for Sri Lanka) that is centred around an old colonial fort used first by the Portuguese, then the Dutch, and eventually the English. Once we got there it was like we had left Sri Lanka and entered a quaint little Portuguese town. We checked into our hotel within the fort walls and immediately went for an explore. We strolled around the cobbled streets and found lots of beautiful old colonial churches and buildings. There was also loads of great cafes and restaurants, something which the rest of Sri Lanka seriously lacks! As it was getting towards the hottest time of the day, we decided to go and have a look around the cricket ground which is located just outside the fort walls with the Indian ocean on either side. I was really excited to see the stadium as it is known as one of the most beautiful cricket grounds in the world. Luckily enough there was actually a match on between Galle CC and Colombo CC. We wandered into the pavilion and took a seat and ended up watching the match for a few hours. The ground had been completely devastated by the Tsunami, but with the help of some cricketers like Muttiah Muralitharan, enough funds were raised to completely renovate the ground. That night we treated ourselves to a pizza at one of the many western style restaurants then watched the sunset over the ramparts of the fort. The next day followed much the same pattern. We wandered around the town, got really hot in the sun, went and watched more cricket, then got a really nice meal for dinner! Although I took Nina's cricket education to the next level and taught her all the fielding positions which she actually grasped pretty well! I also bought a sarong because I got really jealous whenever Nina was wearing hers. I wore it to dinner and got lots of comments from Sri Lankan men saying the design was good but I'd been duped and the material wasn't soft enough.
Today we're heading for Colombo on the coastal train for our last night in Sri Lanka, and one of Nina's friend's dad's offered to put us up for the night as he is living in Colombo at the moment. Next stop India!
E
After our stay at the beach cabanas, we headed west along the coast to a small beach town called Mirissa. It was our first experience on a Sri Lankan bus! Our first of two drivers was a young guy who thought he was driving a Ferrari. He played loud reggae music through a large boom box in the front of the bus and sped his way down the roads near missing motorbikes and pedestrians! Once reaching Mirissa we checked into our new home from 4 nights called Secret Root. We were really pleased with the accommodation, in hindsight it may have been the highlight of our time in Mirissa! The rooms were large and clean and there was loads of nice seating on the veranda around the small hotel. We spent most of the time chilling on the beach. Coming from Marakolliya beach, Mirissa was far busier and the beach was dotted with pretty tacky restaurants which served bad food. It wasn't quite as idyllic but having said that you could swim in the sea at Mirissa whereas in Marakolliya you couldn't, so that made a nice change. Ed was a water baby for the four days and really enjoyed being able to go in the sea. The waves were pretty rough though, paddling wasn't really an option, you had to just stand, wait for the wave, get knocked over by the wave and then get back up again. Third day in, tragedy struck. Whilst in the sea, Ed was confidently taking on the stronger deeper waves, jumping over and diving under, when suddenly a wave took him unawares. Don't worry Ed himself was unscathed... but I wish I could say the same for his -3 prescription goggles. Alas I can't. In one swift wave motion, his favourite goggles were swiped from his head, never to be seen again. I scanned the coast line many times that day but it seems that they are now with the sea, or some lucky person who also has a -3 prescription. One evening we thought we'd try and download a film to watch from Itunes, we chose the very romantic 'American Gangster', we basically just fancied watching a film with Denzel. However, we significantly overestimated the power of Sri Lankan internet. Last time I checked the movie still had 240,000 minutes left until completed download. Perhaps we'll watch it in August some time....
N
Galle 22.02-23.02
We jumped on a bus along the coast again and made our way to Galle. Galle is a reasonably large coastal city (for Sri Lanka) that is centred around an old colonial fort used first by the Portuguese, then the Dutch, and eventually the English. Once we got there it was like we had left Sri Lanka and entered a quaint little Portuguese town. We checked into our hotel within the fort walls and immediately went for an explore. We strolled around the cobbled streets and found lots of beautiful old colonial churches and buildings. There was also loads of great cafes and restaurants, something which the rest of Sri Lanka seriously lacks! As it was getting towards the hottest time of the day, we decided to go and have a look around the cricket ground which is located just outside the fort walls with the Indian ocean on either side. I was really excited to see the stadium as it is known as one of the most beautiful cricket grounds in the world. Luckily enough there was actually a match on between Galle CC and Colombo CC. We wandered into the pavilion and took a seat and ended up watching the match for a few hours. The ground had been completely devastated by the Tsunami, but with the help of some cricketers like Muttiah Muralitharan, enough funds were raised to completely renovate the ground. That night we treated ourselves to a pizza at one of the many western style restaurants then watched the sunset over the ramparts of the fort. The next day followed much the same pattern. We wandered around the town, got really hot in the sun, went and watched more cricket, then got a really nice meal for dinner! Although I took Nina's cricket education to the next level and taught her all the fielding positions which she actually grasped pretty well! I also bought a sarong because I got really jealous whenever Nina was wearing hers. I wore it to dinner and got lots of comments from Sri Lankan men saying the design was good but I'd been duped and the material wasn't soft enough.
Today we're heading for Colombo on the coastal train for our last night in Sri Lanka, and one of Nina's friend's dad's offered to put us up for the night as he is living in Colombo at the moment. Next stop India!
E
No comments:
Post a Comment