We had a late start to the day, having had too much fun the night before. We did miss out on most of the heat so it wasn't too bad.
Took a taxi to the baixa area (lower escarpment part), where most of the classic Maputo buildings are found. Started at the train station, which makes lists of top railway stations in the world. Then zigzagged our way to Praça da Independéncia. Stopped in at the Info building near the plaza, and were met by a gregarious woman. We had beeen referred by both the good book (Lonely Planet) and our hotel in Ilha to call on Jane Flood, who runs walking tours of Maputo, with an architectural focus. Turns out the woman who welcomed us was indeed the one-and-only Jane Flood! She had loads of recommendations for us, and was very helpful.
It was getting late in the day, so we finished our tour of the plaza and then took a taxi home. Maputo is known for its king shrimp, so we headed over to Marna Brasa based on the recommendation from the guest house folks. It was excellent, with a vinho verde. (Most restaurants here have three categories for wine: red, white, and green. The green refers to the age of the wine - verdes are very young wines).
...
We were up at a more reasonable hour this morning. Had the same breakfast (scrambled eggs, buttered toast with the crust cut off, bacon, fruit salad, plain yogurt, and good tea/coffee). It's a standard breakfast served almost everywhere we go, but they do a good job of it here.
Started at the National Art Museum in the baixa. It was good, although half of it was under construction. Walked across to Txhapo Txhapo, a hip little restaurant recommended by Jane Flood. It was quite good, and their mixed fruit drinks were excellent. The air conditioning was a nice break from the heat.
Then onto a couple art galleries in search of souvenirs. First went to Núcleo de Arte, which had some very interesting paintings and sculptures in their showroom. Walked next to Tilandia, which was also good, although I found Núcleo to be more interesting. We went back and this time wandered through the back rooms beyond the bar, where the artists were at work, or at least in the process of getting inspired. (By that I mean drinking and smoking up). There were more pieces on display here, for lower prices. We ended up buying two paintings and two sculptures. It was a long process to pay, as they had to unpack a new printer to print off the document needed to take art out of the country.
By the time we were done it was almost 5pm so we took a taxi home. We had no energy to head out, plus the restaurant at the guest house was quite good and had great atmosphere. Their special of the day was grilled shrimp, so while in Maputo, eat as Maputans. Had another vinho verde, and called it a night.
Maputo was a really enjoyable city, with lots of arts and culture, and really cool architecture. The food was also really quite good. We were glad we tacked it onto our trip to Mozambique.
Wednesday, November 30, 2016
Tuesday, November 29, 2016
Maputo, Mozambique
Breakfast was dull at Hotel Milénio. We were still feeling full from the heavy curries at dinner, so I just had boiled eggs and a bun. The stuff labelled as butter was some sort of processed stuff so I didn't have any.
Anyways we packed up and took a taxi to the airport, a short 3km drive from the centre of town. This was our only internal flight in Mozambique and the only option was LAM, of which I read unpleasant things about their reliability and cancelled flights. We arrived two hours before our flight, and were promptly and efficiently checked in. We boarded on time, and left the gate on schedule. Maybe we were lucky, or maybe you just can't trust everything you read on the web. We scored with the emergency exit row seats and lots of leg room. Flipped open their in-flight magazine and saw a feature article on Jardim de Aloes, where we had just stayed! Overall we were quite pleased with our LAM flight.
In Maputo the guest house had arranged for a taxi to pick us up and sure enough there was a driver with an Sr Erick Da Sousa sign waiting. From the air, I hadn't seen much traffic and it was a quick ten minute drive on good roads to Sommerschield Guest House, in an upscale residential area. We were greeted by Rita and Sylvia, who were great at making us feel at home. They opened the guest house because they wanted people visiting Maputo to have a home away from home.
They have a little restaurant open all day and so we had some lunch, and then headed out to tourist for the afternoon. Walked all the way into town down Av Julius Nyerere, about 4km. The architecture in Maputo is really cool - mostly designed and influenced by Pancho Guedes. The architecture is very distinctive and if I saw a picture of a random building I could likely guess if it was from Maputo.
We stopped in at JN 281 to check out the menu (based on their high rating in tripadvisor), made reservations, and then took a taxi back home. Had some issues with the water (they were doing some work at the guest house to add another 5,000L tank, there have been water shortages in Maputo recently). But everything was fixed up and we were good to go. It was still a bit early so we had a beer on the patio, with a nice breeze blowing through.
Then onto JN 281. Their specialty is picanhna, a popular cut in Brasil but not so common back home in Toronto. We both ordered it. The owner, Pedro, came by to recommend wines. He was quite the character and wine connoisseur. We selected our wine, which he decanted and then came by every couple minutes to sniff to see if it had opened up yet. In the meantime, we were being served slices after slices of picanhna, cut super thin and medium rare. We were worried we would fill up before Pedro allowed us to drink the wine! Finally he gave up on the the bottle, and opened another pricier one (but for us, Pedro said, the same cost). Because this also had to breathe for five minutes, he suggested a caipirinha, to which we obliged. It took them almost five minutes to make the drinks, but never mind, it takes time to make a good drink from scratch. Eventually we had the wine with the picanhna, which went very well.
Somehow we still had room for dessert, a homemade chocolate mousse of a secret family recipe. It was excellent. We took a taxi home and rolled ourselves into bed, rather full from dinner.
Anyways we packed up and took a taxi to the airport, a short 3km drive from the centre of town. This was our only internal flight in Mozambique and the only option was LAM, of which I read unpleasant things about their reliability and cancelled flights. We arrived two hours before our flight, and were promptly and efficiently checked in. We boarded on time, and left the gate on schedule. Maybe we were lucky, or maybe you just can't trust everything you read on the web. We scored with the emergency exit row seats and lots of leg room. Flipped open their in-flight magazine and saw a feature article on Jardim de Aloes, where we had just stayed! Overall we were quite pleased with our LAM flight.
In Maputo the guest house had arranged for a taxi to pick us up and sure enough there was a driver with an Sr Erick Da Sousa sign waiting. From the air, I hadn't seen much traffic and it was a quick ten minute drive on good roads to Sommerschield Guest House, in an upscale residential area. We were greeted by Rita and Sylvia, who were great at making us feel at home. They opened the guest house because they wanted people visiting Maputo to have a home away from home.
They have a little restaurant open all day and so we had some lunch, and then headed out to tourist for the afternoon. Walked all the way into town down Av Julius Nyerere, about 4km. The architecture in Maputo is really cool - mostly designed and influenced by Pancho Guedes. The architecture is very distinctive and if I saw a picture of a random building I could likely guess if it was from Maputo.
We stopped in at JN 281 to check out the menu (based on their high rating in tripadvisor), made reservations, and then took a taxi back home. Had some issues with the water (they were doing some work at the guest house to add another 5,000L tank, there have been water shortages in Maputo recently). But everything was fixed up and we were good to go. It was still a bit early so we had a beer on the patio, with a nice breeze blowing through.
Then onto JN 281. Their specialty is picanhna, a popular cut in Brasil but not so common back home in Toronto. We both ordered it. The owner, Pedro, came by to recommend wines. He was quite the character and wine connoisseur. We selected our wine, which he decanted and then came by every couple minutes to sniff to see if it had opened up yet. In the meantime, we were being served slices after slices of picanhna, cut super thin and medium rare. We were worried we would fill up before Pedro allowed us to drink the wine! Finally he gave up on the the bottle, and opened another pricier one (but for us, Pedro said, the same cost). Because this also had to breathe for five minutes, he suggested a caipirinha, to which we obliged. It took them almost five minutes to make the drinks, but never mind, it takes time to make a good drink from scratch. Eventually we had the wine with the picanhna, which went very well.
Somehow we still had room for dessert, a homemade chocolate mousse of a secret family recipe. It was excellent. We took a taxi home and rolled ourselves into bed, rather full from dinner.
Monday, November 28, 2016
Nampula, Mozambique
We had another enjoyable breakfast at Jardim de Aloes wth Bruno and Judy. Judy gave us a tour of the other two rooms, which had cool antiques that she had collected over time. It's almost like they started the b&b to have somewhere to display all their art! They've also done a great job restoring the place - the old roof beams are hand-hewn from iron wood and are in great shape.
Our driver was waiting at 10am to drive us to Nampula, 2.5 hours from Ilha. We had arranged for him to drive us to see e highlights once in Nampula. We could have just walked around but it was the hottest part of the day.
We stopped first at the busy Sunday market, which had mostly local items for sale. There was a small area with souvenirs, but nothing special. We saw the Cathedral of Nossa Senhora de Fâtima from the outside. Then off to the National Ethnography museum. There was a small market behind the museum, which had better quality than the Sunday market. For a transit stop, it wasn't too bad of a town.
We arrived at Hotel Milénio about 3pm. I was a bit surprised that they had my reservation as they had been spotty with emails. We threw our stuff in our room and grabbed a snack in the hotel lobby (the main restaurant was only open until 3pm for lunch, we just a missed it). We then tried to have a beer, only to discover to our horror that the hotel was dry. This was not mentioned in the Lonely Planet.
So we just used the rather fast wifi to catch up on news.
It's a bit dangerous to walk around at night, so we had dinner in the hotel restaurant. It was mostly Indian food (there's a sizeable population of Indian descent in Nampula). Probably would have gone better with beer but as previously mentioned, the hotel is dry.
Our driver was waiting at 10am to drive us to Nampula, 2.5 hours from Ilha. We had arranged for him to drive us to see e highlights once in Nampula. We could have just walked around but it was the hottest part of the day.
We stopped first at the busy Sunday market, which had mostly local items for sale. There was a small area with souvenirs, but nothing special. We saw the Cathedral of Nossa Senhora de Fâtima from the outside. Then off to the National Ethnography museum. There was a small market behind the museum, which had better quality than the Sunday market. For a transit stop, it wasn't too bad of a town.
We arrived at Hotel Milénio about 3pm. I was a bit surprised that they had my reservation as they had been spotty with emails. We threw our stuff in our room and grabbed a snack in the hotel lobby (the main restaurant was only open until 3pm for lunch, we just a missed it). We then tried to have a beer, only to discover to our horror that the hotel was dry. This was not mentioned in the Lonely Planet.
So we just used the rather fast wifi to catch up on news.
It's a bit dangerous to walk around at night, so we had dinner in the hotel restaurant. It was mostly Indian food (there's a sizeable population of Indian descent in Nampula). Probably would have gone better with beer but as previously mentioned, the hotel is dry.
Sunday, November 27, 2016
Mozambique Island, Mozambique
Breakfast at Jardim de Aloes was on the mid-roof terrace, shaded by the large leaves of an old almond tree. We chatted with Bruno and Judy about our trip, places to see in Ilha (Portuguese for island, and shorthand for Mozambique Island), and restaurants to try and those to just have a coffee.
It was just after 10am by the time we started touring around Stone Town. There was hardly anyone about - probably because it's the hottest part of the day. The old alleys and buildings are cool to see, half of them in states of reconstruction. In five years or so Stone Town will look very different.
We zigzagged through Stone Town, stopping in at the one souvenir store to browse. (I'm sure the number of stores will change too as tourism increases).
By noon we were tired from the heat, and stopped in at Anchor d'Ouro for pizza. Whiled away a couple hours sipping on lime drinks. We thought about a coffee but the power was out so they couldn't run the machine.
We walked back home to wait until 3pm for the cooler air to wander around the rest of Stone Town. There was a wedding somewhere in Ilha and we saw cars decked out in tissue paper flowers, and women in bright red dresses.
Had a beer in the hostel across the street from our hotel, and then went to our rooftop terrace to watch the sunset.
We debated trying another restaurant for dinner, but ended up at Karibu again. Had their tuna with sesame seeds which was the highlight, and a couple other dishes.
We watched the stars from our rooftop terrace after dinner. The wifi was finally working so I posted some pics.
It was just after 10am by the time we started touring around Stone Town. There was hardly anyone about - probably because it's the hottest part of the day. The old alleys and buildings are cool to see, half of them in states of reconstruction. In five years or so Stone Town will look very different.
We zigzagged through Stone Town, stopping in at the one souvenir store to browse. (I'm sure the number of stores will change too as tourism increases).
By noon we were tired from the heat, and stopped in at Anchor d'Ouro for pizza. Whiled away a couple hours sipping on lime drinks. We thought about a coffee but the power was out so they couldn't run the machine.
We walked back home to wait until 3pm for the cooler air to wander around the rest of Stone Town. There was a wedding somewhere in Ilha and we saw cars decked out in tissue paper flowers, and women in bright red dresses.
Had a beer in the hostel across the street from our hotel, and then went to our rooftop terrace to watch the sunset.
We debated trying another restaurant for dinner, but ended up at Karibu again. Had their tuna with sesame seeds which was the highlight, and a couple other dishes.
We watched the stars from our rooftop terrace after dinner. The wifi was finally working so I posted some pics.
Saturday, November 26, 2016
Mozambique Island, Mozambique
We had arranged for a dhow back to Mozambique Island at 2pm, so had a relaxing morning. Packed up our bags which had become more strewn about than normal cause we had had four nights here, plus there was lots of space to spread out. Had lunch, and then boarded the dhow. It was full tide so the dhow was able to come all the way up to the lagoon, and we didn't need to wade through water to board.
Our stay at Coral Lodge included a day trip to the Island, so we had a guide for the afternoon courtesy of Coral Lodge. We docked, and has our bags taken to Jardim de Aloes, owned by a friendly Italian named Bruno. A couple minutes later our guide (Eddie) arrived and we rushed off on our tour.
We quickly saw the Palace of São Paulo and the Fort of São Sebastião. Our guide explained the dark history of slavery with Mozambique Island. There's two colours of rocks used to build the fort - the black coral rock was cut out by slaves from the southern part of the island. That area (Makuti Town) is the poorer half, which floods during rainy season due to the digging out of all the rocks. The lighter coloured rocks were brought from Portugal as ballast for empty ships coming to pick up slaves.
After the Fort we walked through the alleys and streets of Stone Town, and then through Makuti Town. The contrast is quite obvious. We reached the southern point (the island is about 3km long) just in time for the sunset.
By the time we walked back to our hotel we were pretty much done for the day.
Our room at Jardim de Aloes was filled with really cool antiques. My end table was an old safe. It was almost like staying in a museum!
Bruno had recommended Karibu's for dinner, and gave directions - left, right, right, follow the road with the archways, take the fork to the right, pass through two pillars, and you're there.
It was a great little Portuguese restaurant, in a centuries old building with original floors and 20' ceilings. The food was excellent - we split two appetizers and two mains which was too much food but we wanted to try everything.
Walked back home (the alleys are really beautiful at night), and fell asleep.
Our stay at Coral Lodge included a day trip to the Island, so we had a guide for the afternoon courtesy of Coral Lodge. We docked, and has our bags taken to Jardim de Aloes, owned by a friendly Italian named Bruno. A couple minutes later our guide (Eddie) arrived and we rushed off on our tour.
We quickly saw the Palace of São Paulo and the Fort of São Sebastião. Our guide explained the dark history of slavery with Mozambique Island. There's two colours of rocks used to build the fort - the black coral rock was cut out by slaves from the southern part of the island. That area (Makuti Town) is the poorer half, which floods during rainy season due to the digging out of all the rocks. The lighter coloured rocks were brought from Portugal as ballast for empty ships coming to pick up slaves.
After the Fort we walked through the alleys and streets of Stone Town, and then through Makuti Town. The contrast is quite obvious. We reached the southern point (the island is about 3km long) just in time for the sunset.
By the time we walked back to our hotel we were pretty much done for the day.
Our room at Jardim de Aloes was filled with really cool antiques. My end table was an old safe. It was almost like staying in a museum!
Bruno had recommended Karibu's for dinner, and gave directions - left, right, right, follow the road with the archways, take the fork to the right, pass through two pillars, and you're there.
It was a great little Portuguese restaurant, in a centuries old building with original floors and 20' ceilings. The food was excellent - we split two appetizers and two mains which was too much food but we wanted to try everything.
Walked back home (the alleys are really beautiful at night), and fell asleep.
Friday, November 25, 2016
Cabaceira Pequena, Mozambique
The hottest part of the day is between breakfast and lunch so we relaxed in our villa, watching dhows pass by on the water, a nice breeze going through the open windows.
After lunch we were restless so decided to try to walk to the point closest to Mozambique Island, where we could see a big baobab tree. On google maps I could see a foot path the whole way so it didn't seem too complicated. We asked the manager if it was dangerous and she said it was okay, but preferred if we went with a guide from the lodge. She also provided aqua shoes as we had to cross the lagoon.
We started out at 3pm, feeling a little silly having a guide carrying water for us for what we figured was a 30 minute round trip. The guide set out at a quick pace, and we were at the 400-year old baobab tree in about 15 minutes. Then the guide continued on, more inland thorough grasses, then back to the shoreline. We passed by piles of rocks and wood which the locals use to dry out the white rocks, which are ground down and used for whitewashing walls.
We eventually arrived at the village of Cabaceira Pequena, pop. 1,600. Our guide (and most of the staff) are from the village. We walked down the main road, seeing village life as it has existed for centuries. Saw women getting water from the well just outside town. There were four mosques, a hospital, and a primary school. On the way back to the resort, we passed by a soccer game which half the village was watching from the sidelines. It was two teams from the village, teenagers, who were really good. We stopped to watch for a couple minutes, during which one team made a substitution and by the time they changed shirts (they only have 11 shirts for each team) we had left to get back before sunset.
It was really cool to see the village, and the two hour walk was much more than we had planned.
We cleaned up and went to the main lodge for dinner. We had the "Mozambique special" which was rice and five different curries. It was okay. They ran out of our favourite, the prawn curry. We had a last beer at Coral Lodge and then headed off to bed.
After lunch we were restless so decided to try to walk to the point closest to Mozambique Island, where we could see a big baobab tree. On google maps I could see a foot path the whole way so it didn't seem too complicated. We asked the manager if it was dangerous and she said it was okay, but preferred if we went with a guide from the lodge. She also provided aqua shoes as we had to cross the lagoon.
We started out at 3pm, feeling a little silly having a guide carrying water for us for what we figured was a 30 minute round trip. The guide set out at a quick pace, and we were at the 400-year old baobab tree in about 15 minutes. Then the guide continued on, more inland thorough grasses, then back to the shoreline. We passed by piles of rocks and wood which the locals use to dry out the white rocks, which are ground down and used for whitewashing walls.
We eventually arrived at the village of Cabaceira Pequena, pop. 1,600. Our guide (and most of the staff) are from the village. We walked down the main road, seeing village life as it has existed for centuries. Saw women getting water from the well just outside town. There were four mosques, a hospital, and a primary school. On the way back to the resort, we passed by a soccer game which half the village was watching from the sidelines. It was two teams from the village, teenagers, who were really good. We stopped to watch for a couple minutes, during which one team made a substitution and by the time they changed shirts (they only have 11 shirts for each team) we had left to get back before sunset.
It was really cool to see the village, and the two hour walk was much more than we had planned.
We cleaned up and went to the main lodge for dinner. We had the "Mozambique special" which was rice and five different curries. It was okay. They ran out of our favourite, the prawn curry. We had a last beer at Coral Lodge and then headed off to bed.
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Cabaceira Pequena, Mozambique
We woke up jetlagged at 4am, Heather wandered out to the deck facing the ocean to watch the sunrise at 4:30am. (We're at the eastern end of the time zone, the sun is up from 4:30am - 5:30pm). It was cloudy so it just got brighter but no colours. It was very surreal to watch in our tired state.
We fell back asleep until 8am or so and then went to the main lodge for breakfast. The food was great again, although the tea was disappointing, maybe cause our last trip was to Sri Lanka. Heather said the coffee was good though.
We didn't do much until lunch, adjusting to the heat and the time. Then more eating. It was a seafood stew, with lobster, calamari, shrimp, fish. Way too much food but very tasty. I added a little homemade piri piri sauce, which was too hot for me.
After lunch we tried snorkeling up the lagoon but the tide wasn't high enough and so we gave up. The snorkeling gear was brand new, the best I've ever used.
I walked down the beach and tried not to step into the crab holes. The holes are ginormous here, about 4" diameter. The crabs come out of their holes with sand, scoot sideways like in the cartoons, dump the sand, and then scoot back in. Very entertaining. There were also the most interesting shells I've ever seen. I'll have to post a pic of our collection.
Dinner was a choice between seafood and something else. We went with seafood, getting our fill while on the coast.
...
Today we had a little excursion to a nearby island. We tried more snorkeling near the island, but the visibility was bad, so didn't try for long. Had a pretty picnic lunch on the island. It's supposedly one of the highlights of a stay at Coral Lodge. The staff do a great job, but it's just not our thing. It was interesting enough though, and the shells on the beach were even cooler.
Came back home in the dhow, relaxed, cleaned up, and we're just having a cocktail before dinner. There's no wind today, and so a million mosquitoes. The hotel gave us bug spray which we used liberally. There's other guests that arrived today so we no longer have the place to ourselves, it's okay though, I tipped the maître d' so we have the best table :)
We fell back asleep until 8am or so and then went to the main lodge for breakfast. The food was great again, although the tea was disappointing, maybe cause our last trip was to Sri Lanka. Heather said the coffee was good though.
We didn't do much until lunch, adjusting to the heat and the time. Then more eating. It was a seafood stew, with lobster, calamari, shrimp, fish. Way too much food but very tasty. I added a little homemade piri piri sauce, which was too hot for me.
After lunch we tried snorkeling up the lagoon but the tide wasn't high enough and so we gave up. The snorkeling gear was brand new, the best I've ever used.
I walked down the beach and tried not to step into the crab holes. The holes are ginormous here, about 4" diameter. The crabs come out of their holes with sand, scoot sideways like in the cartoons, dump the sand, and then scoot back in. Very entertaining. There were also the most interesting shells I've ever seen. I'll have to post a pic of our collection.
Dinner was a choice between seafood and something else. We went with seafood, getting our fill while on the coast.
...
Today we had a little excursion to a nearby island. We tried more snorkeling near the island, but the visibility was bad, so didn't try for long. Had a pretty picnic lunch on the island. It's supposedly one of the highlights of a stay at Coral Lodge. The staff do a great job, but it's just not our thing. It was interesting enough though, and the shells on the beach were even cooler.
Came back home in the dhow, relaxed, cleaned up, and we're just having a cocktail before dinner. There's no wind today, and so a million mosquitoes. The hotel gave us bug spray which we used liberally. There's other guests that arrived today so we no longer have the place to ourselves, it's okay though, I tipped the maître d' so we have the best table :)
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
Cabaceira Pequena, Mozambique
We finally reached Coral Lodge in Mozambique, 39 hours after we left Toronto. We were trying to figure out if it's the most distant place (time-wise) of all the places we've visited. Without doing all the math, it's up there.
We flew Toronto- Amsterdam- Johannesburg on KLM. The first leg was on an older plane and it was funny to watch everyone trying to use touch gestures on a non-touch screen. There were auto-massage booths at Schipol (€2 for five minutes) that were great. I would have extended my massage but was trapped by the chair and couldn't reach to tap to pay with my iPhone in time.
We stayed overnight in Johannesburg at Sunrock Guesthouse near the airport. The next morning we were back at OR Tambo Intl to catch our flight to Nampula in northern Mozambique. The check-in and departure was really quick, and we were on our way!
The bureaucracy was very structured on arrival. We had to show our Yellow Fever certificate before even entering the airport. The immigration official very closely checked our facial features to make sure it matched our passport pics.
The Coral Lodge driver was waiting at arrivals for us. We tried to get meticals from the ATM but the machine wanted a 6-digit PIN so it didn't work. Oh well. We had USD and rand so we were okay for cash.
It's a tight schedule to get to Coral Lodge from Nampula in the same day as the plane arrives with just enough time to drive to Mozambique Island (2.5 hours) and then cross back to the mainland by dhow (30 minutes) before it gets dark.
The road from Nampula to Mozambique Island is the best paved road in the country. There was a little notebook in the car with the background of each town we drove through. Saw lots for sale along the roadside - grass bundles for thatched roofs, sacks of charcoal, cashew fruit.
The bridge to Mozambique Island is a single-lane road. Every 500m or so there's a place to pullover and allow opposing traffic to pass. The full Mozambique Island is a UNESCO heritage site and it looked really cool as we drove through. We have a couple days here later on to explore.
We reached the north end of the island where we transferred to a dhow. There's no pier or anything, we just rolled up our pants and waded through knee-deep water to board. The water was calm and the sun was just setting as we navigated the sand bars at low tide.
We reached Coral Lodge a few minutes after sunset. We waded into shore while the staff picked up our bags and carried them to our room. We're the only guests right now (there's 10 villas, so it's not busy even when full). We have the entire beach to ourselves which fades into the distance on both sides.
We cleaned up and went to the main lodge for dinner. It was a three-course meal, all very excellent. First was calamari, freshly caught that day. Then a half-lobster each, which was so big we didn't even finish it. Dessert was panacotta, wrapped in a thin shell of fresh mango. Mmm good. A very enjoyable start to our vacation!
We flew Toronto- Amsterdam- Johannesburg on KLM. The first leg was on an older plane and it was funny to watch everyone trying to use touch gestures on a non-touch screen. There were auto-massage booths at Schipol (€2 for five minutes) that were great. I would have extended my massage but was trapped by the chair and couldn't reach to tap to pay with my iPhone in time.
We stayed overnight in Johannesburg at Sunrock Guesthouse near the airport. The next morning we were back at OR Tambo Intl to catch our flight to Nampula in northern Mozambique. The check-in and departure was really quick, and we were on our way!
The bureaucracy was very structured on arrival. We had to show our Yellow Fever certificate before even entering the airport. The immigration official very closely checked our facial features to make sure it matched our passport pics.
The Coral Lodge driver was waiting at arrivals for us. We tried to get meticals from the ATM but the machine wanted a 6-digit PIN so it didn't work. Oh well. We had USD and rand so we were okay for cash.
It's a tight schedule to get to Coral Lodge from Nampula in the same day as the plane arrives with just enough time to drive to Mozambique Island (2.5 hours) and then cross back to the mainland by dhow (30 minutes) before it gets dark.
The road from Nampula to Mozambique Island is the best paved road in the country. There was a little notebook in the car with the background of each town we drove through. Saw lots for sale along the roadside - grass bundles for thatched roofs, sacks of charcoal, cashew fruit.
The bridge to Mozambique Island is a single-lane road. Every 500m or so there's a place to pullover and allow opposing traffic to pass. The full Mozambique Island is a UNESCO heritage site and it looked really cool as we drove through. We have a couple days here later on to explore.
We reached the north end of the island where we transferred to a dhow. There's no pier or anything, we just rolled up our pants and waded through knee-deep water to board. The water was calm and the sun was just setting as we navigated the sand bars at low tide.
We reached Coral Lodge a few minutes after sunset. We waded into shore while the staff picked up our bags and carried them to our room. We're the only guests right now (there's 10 villas, so it's not busy even when full). We have the entire beach to ourselves which fades into the distance on both sides.
We cleaned up and went to the main lodge for dinner. It was a three-course meal, all very excellent. First was calamari, freshly caught that day. Then a half-lobster each, which was so big we didn't even finish it. Dessert was panacotta, wrapped in a thin shell of fresh mango. Mmm good. A very enjoyable start to our vacation!
Saturday, November 12, 2016
Toronto, Canada
We're off to southeastern Africa for six weeks to see Mozambique, Victoria Falls, safaris, and trekking in Lesotho. We didn't think we'd be back on safari so soon (we were in Uganda three years ago), but on our last couple trips we've met a few people who have really liked Mozambique, and so the trip was planned around that.
The Mozambique visa was one of the more laborious visas that I've applied for. There's no consulate in Canada, so we had to FedEx our passports with return envelope (I would have said couriered, but the instructions specified FedEx) to the Mozambique embassy in Washington, with proof of flights, hotels, 2 photos, and a money order payable to the embassy. I wasn't sure how to declare the contents on the FedEx site (to send across the border) as there's a dropdown with dozens of options including a birth certificate, but no passport. I think I selected personal items. The embassy processed our request rather quickly, and within three days we had our passports back with a nice looking full-page visa sticker.
In South Africa we're renting a car for almost three weeks. Car rentals are pretty cheap there, about $20 / day. Almost half of that is for the GPS! It's left drive in South Africa, and I've rented a standard, so it will be a little different. I have driven stick in England for a couple days, and didn't run into anything, so we should be okay.
Our friend Marissa and her friend Nancy are joining us for a couple weeks for the safaris in South Africa and Swaziland. You may remember Marissa from some of our previous trips. In Swaziland we're hoping to see rhinos at Mkhaya Game Reserve. The accommodations are a little freaky -- the walls on the cottages are only about waist-high, with the rest open to the outside!
Victoria Falls is the last of the big four waterfalls that have been on my list forever (the others being Niagara, Angel Falls, and Iguazu). There's others that have added to list over time, such as Kaiteur Falls and Gullfoss, but it started with those four because they were marked on the world map I had at the time. Victoria Falls is at low-flow while we're there which means we can swim in Devil's Pool, overlooking the falls. We're staying in both the Zimbabwe and Zambia sides of the falls (or Zim and Zam, as the guide books call it), so we'll get to a total of six countries this trip.
The Mozambique visa was one of the more laborious visas that I've applied for. There's no consulate in Canada, so we had to FedEx our passports with return envelope (I would have said couriered, but the instructions specified FedEx) to the Mozambique embassy in Washington, with proof of flights, hotels, 2 photos, and a money order payable to the embassy. I wasn't sure how to declare the contents on the FedEx site (to send across the border) as there's a dropdown with dozens of options including a birth certificate, but no passport. I think I selected personal items. The embassy processed our request rather quickly, and within three days we had our passports back with a nice looking full-page visa sticker.
In South Africa we're renting a car for almost three weeks. Car rentals are pretty cheap there, about $20 / day. Almost half of that is for the GPS! It's left drive in South Africa, and I've rented a standard, so it will be a little different. I have driven stick in England for a couple days, and didn't run into anything, so we should be okay.
Our friend Marissa and her friend Nancy are joining us for a couple weeks for the safaris in South Africa and Swaziland. You may remember Marissa from some of our previous trips. In Swaziland we're hoping to see rhinos at Mkhaya Game Reserve. The accommodations are a little freaky -- the walls on the cottages are only about waist-high, with the rest open to the outside!
Victoria Falls is the last of the big four waterfalls that have been on my list forever (the others being Niagara, Angel Falls, and Iguazu). There's others that have added to list over time, such as Kaiteur Falls and Gullfoss, but it started with those four because they were marked on the world map I had at the time. Victoria Falls is at low-flow while we're there which means we can swim in Devil's Pool, overlooking the falls. We're staying in both the Zimbabwe and Zambia sides of the falls (or Zim and Zam, as the guide books call it), so we'll get to a total of six countries this trip.
Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Toronto, Canada
So we're finally home after nine weeks traveling through Myanmar, Bhutan and Sri Lanka! It was our longest trip together so far. Each leg was unique, and having Bhutan in the middle varied the climates too.
Myanmar has amazing sights. Bagan is one of the coolest things to see in the world (#2 on my list), in my opinion, topped only by Machu Picchu. Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon made it in at #16, so it was quite the start to our trip. The food on the other hand was disappointing -- it was very heavy, as Burmese like to cook with lots and lots of oil. We were lucky to be able to stay at Macleod Island off the southern tip of Myanmar in the Andaman Sea. This area was previously off-limits to tourists, but now it's possible to visit. It's off the beaten path right now, but that will change quickly. Tourist infrastructure is coming along here -- we used ATMs in all the tourist places, and mid-range accommodation is more readily available around the country (unlike say Jordan, where there's maybe 3 cities with midrange hotels). Wifi was pretty good in almost all the places we stayed at. Cheap domestic flights make it easy to get around -- we either flew or took boats on the Irrawady to get between cities.
Bhutan was exactly how I had pictured it. Tiger's Nest was really cool to see, although I enjoyed even more the five days on the Druk Path trek, and the dzong in Punakha. Having a full-time guide turned out to be not so bad, and in fact is a great way for Bhutan to teach visitors about the history and culture of their country. Out of the three countries we visited this trip, Bhutan is the one you should visit now before it changes. Bhutan has historically followed a "high value low impact" strategy, but the National Council is debating dropping the tariff for international visitors. So I think the low number of tourists, which was one of the main attractions for us, will soon change. There were 68K international tourists in 2014 (up from 38K in 2011), and in addition 65K regional tourists who are exempt from the tariff. fyi if you are thinking of going to Bhutan, you should read the Bhutan Tourism Monitor's annual report, it's really useful for trip planning. In terms of infrastructure, we were able to use ATMs and there was decent wifi at all the hotels. The food was really good, and very spicy (chilies are a main ingredient in some dishes!), but all the restaurants can tone it down for tourists. We got accustomed (a little) to the spiciness and found other food bland afterwards without the chilies.
Sri Lanka has a little bit of everything -- ruins, beaches, diving, colonial towns, trekking, safari. There's lots of boutique hotels, more so in the south. I was very surprised at the ruins -- Polonnaruwa was amazing, up there with other ruins in the world. ATMs and wifi were everywhere.
From a technology standpoint, fast wifi is now so ubiquitous that I was able to upload all my outtakes as we went (average of about 100 pics a day). Another change on this trip was downloadable Google Maps (I know it was possible previously to download maps from 3rd parties, but it's much easier in Google Maps). So now, when we look at the map while walking about, we don't attract the attention of every local as we used to when pulling out the guide book to look at the map.
We started thinking about our next trip on the flight home. It will likely be food-based -- maybe Argentina (there's lots to Argentina that we haven't yet seen). Anyways, I'm sure we'll change our minds about 10 times before we settle on a place. Until then!
Myanmar has amazing sights. Bagan is one of the coolest things to see in the world (#2 on my list), in my opinion, topped only by Machu Picchu. Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon made it in at #16, so it was quite the start to our trip. The food on the other hand was disappointing -- it was very heavy, as Burmese like to cook with lots and lots of oil. We were lucky to be able to stay at Macleod Island off the southern tip of Myanmar in the Andaman Sea. This area was previously off-limits to tourists, but now it's possible to visit. It's off the beaten path right now, but that will change quickly. Tourist infrastructure is coming along here -- we used ATMs in all the tourist places, and mid-range accommodation is more readily available around the country (unlike say Jordan, where there's maybe 3 cities with midrange hotels). Wifi was pretty good in almost all the places we stayed at. Cheap domestic flights make it easy to get around -- we either flew or took boats on the Irrawady to get between cities.
Bhutan was exactly how I had pictured it. Tiger's Nest was really cool to see, although I enjoyed even more the five days on the Druk Path trek, and the dzong in Punakha. Having a full-time guide turned out to be not so bad, and in fact is a great way for Bhutan to teach visitors about the history and culture of their country. Out of the three countries we visited this trip, Bhutan is the one you should visit now before it changes. Bhutan has historically followed a "high value low impact" strategy, but the National Council is debating dropping the tariff for international visitors. So I think the low number of tourists, which was one of the main attractions for us, will soon change. There were 68K international tourists in 2014 (up from 38K in 2011), and in addition 65K regional tourists who are exempt from the tariff. fyi if you are thinking of going to Bhutan, you should read the Bhutan Tourism Monitor's annual report, it's really useful for trip planning. In terms of infrastructure, we were able to use ATMs and there was decent wifi at all the hotels. The food was really good, and very spicy (chilies are a main ingredient in some dishes!), but all the restaurants can tone it down for tourists. We got accustomed (a little) to the spiciness and found other food bland afterwards without the chilies.
Sri Lanka has a little bit of everything -- ruins, beaches, diving, colonial towns, trekking, safari. There's lots of boutique hotels, more so in the south. I was very surprised at the ruins -- Polonnaruwa was amazing, up there with other ruins in the world. ATMs and wifi were everywhere.
From a technology standpoint, fast wifi is now so ubiquitous that I was able to upload all my outtakes as we went (average of about 100 pics a day). Another change on this trip was downloadable Google Maps (I know it was possible previously to download maps from 3rd parties, but it's much easier in Google Maps). So now, when we look at the map while walking about, we don't attract the attention of every local as we used to when pulling out the guide book to look at the map.
We started thinking about our next trip on the flight home. It will likely be food-based -- maybe Argentina (there's lots to Argentina that we haven't yet seen). Anyways, I'm sure we'll change our minds about 10 times before we settle on a place. Until then!
Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Bangkok, Thailand
We were up at 4am for the 2nd time in a week to catch our transportation, this morning a 7:20am flight from Colombo to Bangkok. It's about an hour drive from downtown Colombo to the airport (twice that during the day with traffic). Heather's foam roller (lost on the train ride here and supposedly found, and to be delivered to the hotel) didn't appear over the four days we spent in Colombo, so it is officially lost.
We had no problems carrying our souvenirs as carry-on on SriLankan Airlines. (Emirates is much stricter so we'll have to figure something out for the flight home to Toronto.) Spent our last rupees on very expensive teas and muffins (equivalent of over $20 USD for two teas and two muffins) while waiting for the gate to open. Our flight was an older plane and the seats weren't that comfortable, but it beat standing up on a train for seven hours.
We were lucky going through immigration at BKK. The line-up is normally about an hour, but it was temporarily overflowed when we arrived so they shunted us to a VIP line-up which only took 15 minutes! We hit a very narrow window with our luck, as the other passengers on our plane were nowhere to be seen when we picked up our luggage from the conveyor.
The taxi to our hotel was also quicker than previous, maybe because it was the middle of the day. We checked in, got our left-luggage (which was now five (!) bags of souvenirs and winter clothes). We had had snacks at the Colombo airport, and then had breakfast on the plane, so we weren't hungry for lunch in Bangkok. Just munched on the apples in the room. Measured the bigger souvenirs using string, so that we could shop for a suitcase that fit.
We were first in the lounge for happy hour at 5:30pm. (Maybe skipping lunch wasn't a great idea?) Grazed on the tapas and had a few drinks. We then threw caution to the wind and had a coffee after 5pm! *gasp* This was an intentional attempt to mess up our sleep to get back on Eastern Standard Time (a 12-hour difference from Bangkok).
We decided to head into the night market to look for a large suitcase, rather than wait until tomorrow. Took the skytrain two stops to the start of the market. There were more stalls than our previous visit prior to Bhutan when it was raining. Wandered through, but didn't see anything else souvenir-wise. Came across a luggage store, and bought the largest suitcase they had, which according to my string measurements would fit everything, for about $30 USD. It will go straight to Goodwill when we get back home, if it survives the trip, and doesn't fold up like a cheap suitcase, haha.
I was still a bit hungry so we went to the italian restaurant in the hotel. The restaurant seating area was closed (it was 10:30pm) but they served us poolside. We split a draft beer and the pizza, and then went to bed, enjoying our last chance to sleep in a bed until we got home.
...
Slept in, thanks to the late coffee keeping us up for part of the night. After breakfast we took the boat to the tourist area, to go to the amulet market near the temples. We had walked quickly through the market on our first time through, but not really looked at it. I was looking for some small trinkets as souvenirs. (Back home, we have an old wooden hotel key holder, with 100 key boxes. We figured we'd buy some small items from each country that we visit together. We're up to 19 now. The amulets would make a nice little souvenir).
There were even more tourists in Bangkok as it's the height of busy season. We were glad we had done our touristing in early December when it was just busy. Had lunch at a ramen place near the docks, and then caught the boat home.
Spent the rest of the afternoon packing our souvenirs in the suitcase we bought at the market the previous night. All of our clothing now became wrapping for fragile souvenirs. All the souvenirs fit in the suitcase, including the large butter tea urn from Bhutan. I was pretty sure the suitcase was within the size limits allowed by Emirates, but was concerned about the weight. In economy we were allowed two pieces each, with a weight restriction on both the total weight, and the individual weight. I thought the big suitcase was over the individual weight.
We celebrated the end of our vacation at the hotel's italian restaurant, trying their four-course degustazion menu. It was really good. Had a espresso to finish off, so that we'd be able to stay awake until our flight left at 2am.
Checked out at 10pm (it was easier to book the room for the night, even though we were leaving at 10pm) and caught a taxi to BKK airport. It normally takes an hour but it was only 30 minutes at night! But we used up the extra time while checking in. The large suitcase was over our weight limit, and it cost $50 USD in overage charges, which took almost 30 minutes for Emirates to process.
It was a long ways home, 7 hours to Dubai, 4 hours layover, and then 14 hours to Toronto. It was rush hour in Toronto, so took the UP Express to downtown and then a taxi home. The total cost was about the same as a taxi straight from Pearson to home, but this way we skipped the rush hour traffic. Home at last!
We had no problems carrying our souvenirs as carry-on on SriLankan Airlines. (Emirates is much stricter so we'll have to figure something out for the flight home to Toronto.) Spent our last rupees on very expensive teas and muffins (equivalent of over $20 USD for two teas and two muffins) while waiting for the gate to open. Our flight was an older plane and the seats weren't that comfortable, but it beat standing up on a train for seven hours.
We were lucky going through immigration at BKK. The line-up is normally about an hour, but it was temporarily overflowed when we arrived so they shunted us to a VIP line-up which only took 15 minutes! We hit a very narrow window with our luck, as the other passengers on our plane were nowhere to be seen when we picked up our luggage from the conveyor.
The taxi to our hotel was also quicker than previous, maybe because it was the middle of the day. We checked in, got our left-luggage (which was now five (!) bags of souvenirs and winter clothes). We had had snacks at the Colombo airport, and then had breakfast on the plane, so we weren't hungry for lunch in Bangkok. Just munched on the apples in the room. Measured the bigger souvenirs using string, so that we could shop for a suitcase that fit.
We were first in the lounge for happy hour at 5:30pm. (Maybe skipping lunch wasn't a great idea?) Grazed on the tapas and had a few drinks. We then threw caution to the wind and had a coffee after 5pm! *gasp* This was an intentional attempt to mess up our sleep to get back on Eastern Standard Time (a 12-hour difference from Bangkok).
We decided to head into the night market to look for a large suitcase, rather than wait until tomorrow. Took the skytrain two stops to the start of the market. There were more stalls than our previous visit prior to Bhutan when it was raining. Wandered through, but didn't see anything else souvenir-wise. Came across a luggage store, and bought the largest suitcase they had, which according to my string measurements would fit everything, for about $30 USD. It will go straight to Goodwill when we get back home, if it survives the trip, and doesn't fold up like a cheap suitcase, haha.
I was still a bit hungry so we went to the italian restaurant in the hotel. The restaurant seating area was closed (it was 10:30pm) but they served us poolside. We split a draft beer and the pizza, and then went to bed, enjoying our last chance to sleep in a bed until we got home.
...
Slept in, thanks to the late coffee keeping us up for part of the night. After breakfast we took the boat to the tourist area, to go to the amulet market near the temples. We had walked quickly through the market on our first time through, but not really looked at it. I was looking for some small trinkets as souvenirs. (Back home, we have an old wooden hotel key holder, with 100 key boxes. We figured we'd buy some small items from each country that we visit together. We're up to 19 now. The amulets would make a nice little souvenir).
There were even more tourists in Bangkok as it's the height of busy season. We were glad we had done our touristing in early December when it was just busy. Had lunch at a ramen place near the docks, and then caught the boat home.
Spent the rest of the afternoon packing our souvenirs in the suitcase we bought at the market the previous night. All of our clothing now became wrapping for fragile souvenirs. All the souvenirs fit in the suitcase, including the large butter tea urn from Bhutan. I was pretty sure the suitcase was within the size limits allowed by Emirates, but was concerned about the weight. In economy we were allowed two pieces each, with a weight restriction on both the total weight, and the individual weight. I thought the big suitcase was over the individual weight.
We celebrated the end of our vacation at the hotel's italian restaurant, trying their four-course degustazion menu. It was really good. Had a espresso to finish off, so that we'd be able to stay awake until our flight left at 2am.
Checked out at 10pm (it was easier to book the room for the night, even though we were leaving at 10pm) and caught a taxi to BKK airport. It normally takes an hour but it was only 30 minutes at night! But we used up the extra time while checking in. The large suitcase was over our weight limit, and it cost $50 USD in overage charges, which took almost 30 minutes for Emirates to process.
It was a long ways home, 7 hours to Dubai, 4 hours layover, and then 14 hours to Toronto. It was rush hour in Toronto, so took the UP Express to downtown and then a taxi home. The total cost was about the same as a taxi straight from Pearson to home, but this way we skipped the rush hour traffic. Home at last!
Sunday, December 27, 2015
Colombo, Sri Lanka
Heather woke up feeling a bit under the weather so we had a slower start to the day. On Sundays there's an outdoor art market near the National Museum, so we tuktuk'd over and checked it out. The quality was good, much better than I had expected.
Back in Kamburugamuwa, Heather had really liked the painting that was hung in our room. We asked the hotel owners about it, but all they could remember was that they bought it in an art market in Colombo. The artist had signed the painting but it wasn't really readable.
So by luck we recognized some paintings by the same artist at the Sunday art market! There was just a small sampling on display, so we got the contact info for the artist, to see if they have anything similar to the one Heather liked.
Went to some more souvenir places, and then had a late lunch at Mango, an Indian restaurant near our hotel. It was tasty but a bit heavy.
It was drizzling on our walk home, only the 3rd time it's rained on us on the whole trip over nine weeks! Pretty lucky. We had our umbrellas so we stayed dry.
Had dinner at the hotel again. We were getting deep into the menu and it was getting more average. Didnt have too much to drink as we had an early wake up call at 4am to catch our flight to Bangkok. It did feel like the end of our trip -- the rest is just getting back home to Toronto.
Back in Kamburugamuwa, Heather had really liked the painting that was hung in our room. We asked the hotel owners about it, but all they could remember was that they bought it in an art market in Colombo. The artist had signed the painting but it wasn't really readable.
So by luck we recognized some paintings by the same artist at the Sunday art market! There was just a small sampling on display, so we got the contact info for the artist, to see if they have anything similar to the one Heather liked.
Went to some more souvenir places, and then had a late lunch at Mango, an Indian restaurant near our hotel. It was tasty but a bit heavy.
It was drizzling on our walk home, only the 3rd time it's rained on us on the whole trip over nine weeks! Pretty lucky. We had our umbrellas so we stayed dry.
Had dinner at the hotel again. We were getting deep into the menu and it was getting more average. Didnt have too much to drink as we had an early wake up call at 4am to catch our flight to Bangkok. It did feel like the end of our trip -- the rest is just getting back home to Toronto.
Saturday, December 26, 2015
Colombo, Sri Lanka
We had a quiet Christmas in Colombo. Everything was closed (and it was a Friday so the Muslim shops were mostly closed too). There was no traffic on the roads at all. This worked out for us, as we wanted to spend a day walking about the Colombo Fort area to see all the old colonial architecture.
There's a lot of old buildings in Colombo Fort crumbling away; gentrification is under way and restoring the glory of the buildings. The Fort area is contained and smallish (we walked up and down every street in about two hours) and it's easy to see most of the area developing into a tourist destination like the old town in Galle. While in the Old Dutch Hospital yesterday (a smaller version of the Distillery District in Toronto), we made reservations at the Ministry of Crab a local institution, for lunch on Dec 26.
Walked though the markets in Pettah, saw the largest banana market I've ever seen. We had a hankering for sushi (some of the highest rated restaurants in tripadvisor were Japanese, and Colombo's on the ocean).
The only restaurants open were those in large tourist hotels, so took a tuktuk to Yu Mi in the Taj hotel. The sushi was okay; fresh but a little bland. The Japanese tea was very good, served in a proper teapot and cups. Anyways the sushi hit the spot.
As we were walking home, another couple waved to us from inside the Taj. It took us a few seconds to place the faces - they were also guests at our hotel.
Relaxed for the rest of the afternoon. Our room had a great covered porch area with seating and overhead fan. Very nice for reading or having a beer. (The beers had been delivered earlier to our minibar cause Christmas is a dry day by law in Sri Lanka).
Around 15 minutes to sunset, took a tuktuk out to Galle Face Green to watch the sunset. The boardwalk along Galle Face Green is very popular with locals at sunset and it was even busier being a holiday. The sunset was nice. It was just the sun and the ocean but no subject like boats or islands so I didn't post any pics.
Had dinner at the hotel again. It has great ambience and the kitchen is highly rated. We figured we'd have lunches at other places, and then dinners here every day. It's more relaxing not to have to take tuktuks after we'd cleaned up, and the kitchen was very good at our hotel.
...
Ministry of Crab day! We started at the National Museum close to our hotel, which was great. It was more interesting because we'd already seen most of the ruins documented in the museum. We spent about 90 minutes going through.
Took a tuktuk to the Ministry of Crab. Most of the tuktuk drivers we took today remarked about it being the 11th anniversary of the tsunami that killed over 40,000 people in Sri Lanka on Boxing Day 2004. Dec 26 is now National Safety Day, but I'm not sure what that entails.
We arrived early at the restaurant, but were able to get seated. It's quite a production here. We ordered a small chili garlic crab each (600g), garlic butter clams to split as a starter, homemade ginger beers, and freshly baked kade bread.
Got our bibs and ginger beer.
The clams were excellent, perfectly cooked (Heather is very particular about her seafood).
Next came the crabs. Served in the shell, with lots of sauce to dip the kade. Mmm good! (Not as good as the king crab we had in the market in Santiago, but very good). At first we thought we may need to order more clams, but there's plenty of meat on the crabs here and we were stuffed by the end. Heather couldn't even finish hers and I had to help :)
For dessert went to nearby Heladiv Tea, which had excellent tea and dessert, and lousy service.
We were both stuffed. Took a tuktuk down Galle Rd to Barefoot, a local fabric store that Heather had been wanting to check out. Souvenir shopped, and then walked towards the hotel checking out the stores (in particular looking for the Cashew Corporation shop - cashews are a big crop here). Didn't find the cashew place, and ended up walking all the way home, just as well after the big lunch.
We were still full at dinner, so just ordered some smaller items and called it tapas. Also had a few drinks (Heather tried their arrak cocktail, I had some Lion Lagers) as the bar was able to serve today.
There's a lot of old buildings in Colombo Fort crumbling away; gentrification is under way and restoring the glory of the buildings. The Fort area is contained and smallish (we walked up and down every street in about two hours) and it's easy to see most of the area developing into a tourist destination like the old town in Galle. While in the Old Dutch Hospital yesterday (a smaller version of the Distillery District in Toronto), we made reservations at the Ministry of Crab a local institution, for lunch on Dec 26.
Walked though the markets in Pettah, saw the largest banana market I've ever seen. We had a hankering for sushi (some of the highest rated restaurants in tripadvisor were Japanese, and Colombo's on the ocean).
The only restaurants open were those in large tourist hotels, so took a tuktuk to Yu Mi in the Taj hotel. The sushi was okay; fresh but a little bland. The Japanese tea was very good, served in a proper teapot and cups. Anyways the sushi hit the spot.
As we were walking home, another couple waved to us from inside the Taj. It took us a few seconds to place the faces - they were also guests at our hotel.
Relaxed for the rest of the afternoon. Our room had a great covered porch area with seating and overhead fan. Very nice for reading or having a beer. (The beers had been delivered earlier to our minibar cause Christmas is a dry day by law in Sri Lanka).
Around 15 minutes to sunset, took a tuktuk out to Galle Face Green to watch the sunset. The boardwalk along Galle Face Green is very popular with locals at sunset and it was even busier being a holiday. The sunset was nice. It was just the sun and the ocean but no subject like boats or islands so I didn't post any pics.
Had dinner at the hotel again. It has great ambience and the kitchen is highly rated. We figured we'd have lunches at other places, and then dinners here every day. It's more relaxing not to have to take tuktuks after we'd cleaned up, and the kitchen was very good at our hotel.
...
Ministry of Crab day! We started at the National Museum close to our hotel, which was great. It was more interesting because we'd already seen most of the ruins documented in the museum. We spent about 90 minutes going through.
Took a tuktuk to the Ministry of Crab. Most of the tuktuk drivers we took today remarked about it being the 11th anniversary of the tsunami that killed over 40,000 people in Sri Lanka on Boxing Day 2004. Dec 26 is now National Safety Day, but I'm not sure what that entails.
We arrived early at the restaurant, but were able to get seated. It's quite a production here. We ordered a small chili garlic crab each (600g), garlic butter clams to split as a starter, homemade ginger beers, and freshly baked kade bread.
Got our bibs and ginger beer.
The clams were excellent, perfectly cooked (Heather is very particular about her seafood).
Next came the crabs. Served in the shell, with lots of sauce to dip the kade. Mmm good! (Not as good as the king crab we had in the market in Santiago, but very good). At first we thought we may need to order more clams, but there's plenty of meat on the crabs here and we were stuffed by the end. Heather couldn't even finish hers and I had to help :)
For dessert went to nearby Heladiv Tea, which had excellent tea and dessert, and lousy service.
We were both stuffed. Took a tuktuk down Galle Rd to Barefoot, a local fabric store that Heather had been wanting to check out. Souvenir shopped, and then walked towards the hotel checking out the stores (in particular looking for the Cashew Corporation shop - cashews are a big crop here). Didn't find the cashew place, and ended up walking all the way home, just as well after the big lunch.
We were still full at dinner, so just ordered some smaller items and called it tapas. Also had a few drinks (Heather tried their arrak cocktail, I had some Lion Lagers) as the bar was able to serve today.
Thursday, December 24, 2015
Colombo, Sri Lanka
So here is my 2nd best train ride story ever. (It will be hard to top the story of getting left off the train in Siberia).
We woke up at 4am to catch our 5am train from Anuradhapura to Colombo. That's not nearly as bad as it sounds as we've been in bed by 9pm most nights.
Our tuktuk driver drove us over to the train station at 4:30am. The station was crowded with locals, lined up to buy tickets. It was likely the busiest travel day of the year, a combination of Christmas and Poya, the full moon celebration. Otherwise we would have had no issues getting 1st class tickets and seats.
The platform was crowded, with people staking out their spots on the platform edge. Heather and I discussed our strategy - Heather would jump in first and grab seats, and I would follow with both our packs. I had had some experience boarding crowded trains traveling hard seat with Gerry through China years ago, for Heather it was fairly new.
The train pulled into the station on time. People jumped into the open doorways well before the train stopped. Next thing I knew, Heather had jumped on too. I had to wait another 10 seconds for the train to stop, shuffling down the platform to get on the same car that Heather boarded.
It was madness on the train, as people pushed through in both directions trying to find seats and/or join their family and friends that had grabbed and saved seats.
Unfortunately after getting on the train, Heather had turned left into the 3rd class car instead of right into the 2nd class. By the time she realized (just a few seconds) and turned around it was too late - all the seats were gone.
So we situated ourselves in the middle of the car, with the hope that it would just be crowded at the doorways. At least we had space on the luggage racks for our big packs, plus two bags of souvenirs, and Heather's foam roller (which fit perfectly in a canvas bag that she got at Winners).
We settled in standing up for the scheduled five hours to Colombo. It was okay for the first couple hours. The sun was yet to rise so it was cooler. We had a couple Snickers bars as our breakfast.
I had offlined the full train route in Google Maps (this option just appeared yesterday on the iPhone app). But I couldn't access any satellites through the metal train top, so while we had a map, it was hard to tell where we were. The train station signs weren't visible through the windows as we were standing.
Every 20 minutes or so we stopped at a station and more people boarded. By 8am, the aisles were full, and people started crowding into the space between the seats. The etiquette we observed was that kids were always allowed to go the windows, standing in the floor space in front of seats, the seated passengers becoming their uncle or auntie. If someone gave up their seat (eg to a parent with a baby) then they got dibs on the floor space. The advantage of the floor space in between the seats is that by etiquette that was limited to one adult.
In the aisle proper, it was as many people that could fit. By 9am, it was so crowded I couldn't move my feet to adjust them. It wasn't always possible to reach a handhold for balance, so we just held onto each other.
More people boarded. The rack space was at a premium, and another passenger adjusted our smaller bags to fit theirs. It was a few seats down so we couldn't reach to make sure ours were still secure. It only looked like foam roller might fall - but it was light so wouldn't hurt anyone.
About 20 minutes later we heard half the car gasp. We looked around, and realized that the foam roller had fallen, bounced off someone's head, and right out the open window.
We knew it was just a foam roller and easily replaceable, but the other passengers didn't. They thought a valuable luggage belonging to the westerners had just been lost. Heather had actually debated leaving the roller behind in the hotel, as we were near the end of the trip and it's a nuisance to cart through airports as carry on. So we weren't concerned at all about the loss, it was sort of funny. The only part Heather wanted was the bag, as she hadn't seen anything similar anywhere.
By 10am (the train was running about an hour late) it was so crowded I didn't need hand holds for balance - I was so squished up against the other passengers that there was nowhere to fall over.
There was an excited conversation on the car near where the foam roller had fallen out the window, and then one of the passengers declared, 'they have found your luggage'. The guy asked us to write our address, and then it would be delivered!
We had thought most people would get off the train at Colombo, making it easier to get all our stuff. But most people stayed on the train. Just before Colombo, a couple other passengers who were disembarking told us to get ready and push for the door.
So we pushed and were pushed through the crowd to the door as the train stopped at Colombo. I'm still not clear on how we got off the train with all our stuff. It was almost like we body surfed to the exit, pointing out our luggage on the racks along the way, which other passengers added to the flowing current and they floated beside us until we popped out the door. It was like magic.
There were as many people on the platform waiting to board as were already on the train, including lots of backpackers. I didn't see how they could all fit.
We got our packs together and got a tuktuk to our hotel (Taru Villas Lake Lodge). We had splurged on an upgraded room as it was the last stop on our trip, which looked even better after the train ride.
Had lunch, cleaned up, and then went into Colombo Fort for a couple hours. Most places were closed today (Dec 24) because of Poya, and everything is closed Dec 25 for Christmas.
By law, alcohol isn't served on either Poya or Christmas (amongst other days). Hotels can get around this by stocking your mini bar to order, as long as you drink in your room. Our room had a nice patio and garden area, so that worked for us :)
Had dinner at the hotel (most restaurants were closed), a long ways away from our train ride experience.
We woke up at 4am to catch our 5am train from Anuradhapura to Colombo. That's not nearly as bad as it sounds as we've been in bed by 9pm most nights.
Our tuktuk driver drove us over to the train station at 4:30am. The station was crowded with locals, lined up to buy tickets. It was likely the busiest travel day of the year, a combination of Christmas and Poya, the full moon celebration. Otherwise we would have had no issues getting 1st class tickets and seats.
The platform was crowded, with people staking out their spots on the platform edge. Heather and I discussed our strategy - Heather would jump in first and grab seats, and I would follow with both our packs. I had had some experience boarding crowded trains traveling hard seat with Gerry through China years ago, for Heather it was fairly new.
The train pulled into the station on time. People jumped into the open doorways well before the train stopped. Next thing I knew, Heather had jumped on too. I had to wait another 10 seconds for the train to stop, shuffling down the platform to get on the same car that Heather boarded.
It was madness on the train, as people pushed through in both directions trying to find seats and/or join their family and friends that had grabbed and saved seats.
Unfortunately after getting on the train, Heather had turned left into the 3rd class car instead of right into the 2nd class. By the time she realized (just a few seconds) and turned around it was too late - all the seats were gone.
So we situated ourselves in the middle of the car, with the hope that it would just be crowded at the doorways. At least we had space on the luggage racks for our big packs, plus two bags of souvenirs, and Heather's foam roller (which fit perfectly in a canvas bag that she got at Winners).
We settled in standing up for the scheduled five hours to Colombo. It was okay for the first couple hours. The sun was yet to rise so it was cooler. We had a couple Snickers bars as our breakfast.
I had offlined the full train route in Google Maps (this option just appeared yesterday on the iPhone app). But I couldn't access any satellites through the metal train top, so while we had a map, it was hard to tell where we were. The train station signs weren't visible through the windows as we were standing.
Every 20 minutes or so we stopped at a station and more people boarded. By 8am, the aisles were full, and people started crowding into the space between the seats. The etiquette we observed was that kids were always allowed to go the windows, standing in the floor space in front of seats, the seated passengers becoming their uncle or auntie. If someone gave up their seat (eg to a parent with a baby) then they got dibs on the floor space. The advantage of the floor space in between the seats is that by etiquette that was limited to one adult.
In the aisle proper, it was as many people that could fit. By 9am, it was so crowded I couldn't move my feet to adjust them. It wasn't always possible to reach a handhold for balance, so we just held onto each other.
More people boarded. The rack space was at a premium, and another passenger adjusted our smaller bags to fit theirs. It was a few seats down so we couldn't reach to make sure ours were still secure. It only looked like foam roller might fall - but it was light so wouldn't hurt anyone.
About 20 minutes later we heard half the car gasp. We looked around, and realized that the foam roller had fallen, bounced off someone's head, and right out the open window.
We knew it was just a foam roller and easily replaceable, but the other passengers didn't. They thought a valuable luggage belonging to the westerners had just been lost. Heather had actually debated leaving the roller behind in the hotel, as we were near the end of the trip and it's a nuisance to cart through airports as carry on. So we weren't concerned at all about the loss, it was sort of funny. The only part Heather wanted was the bag, as she hadn't seen anything similar anywhere.
By 10am (the train was running about an hour late) it was so crowded I didn't need hand holds for balance - I was so squished up against the other passengers that there was nowhere to fall over.
There was an excited conversation on the car near where the foam roller had fallen out the window, and then one of the passengers declared, 'they have found your luggage'. The guy asked us to write our address, and then it would be delivered!
We had thought most people would get off the train at Colombo, making it easier to get all our stuff. But most people stayed on the train. Just before Colombo, a couple other passengers who were disembarking told us to get ready and push for the door.
So we pushed and were pushed through the crowd to the door as the train stopped at Colombo. I'm still not clear on how we got off the train with all our stuff. It was almost like we body surfed to the exit, pointing out our luggage on the racks along the way, which other passengers added to the flowing current and they floated beside us until we popped out the door. It was like magic.
There were as many people on the platform waiting to board as were already on the train, including lots of backpackers. I didn't see how they could all fit.
We got our packs together and got a tuktuk to our hotel (Taru Villas Lake Lodge). We had splurged on an upgraded room as it was the last stop on our trip, which looked even better after the train ride.
Had lunch, cleaned up, and then went into Colombo Fort for a couple hours. Most places were closed today (Dec 24) because of Poya, and everything is closed Dec 25 for Christmas.
By law, alcohol isn't served on either Poya or Christmas (amongst other days). Hotels can get around this by stocking your mini bar to order, as long as you drink in your room. Our room had a nice patio and garden area, so that worked for us :)
Had dinner at the hotel (most restaurants were closed), a long ways away from our train ride experience.
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka
Had breakfast at 7:15am to get an early start at Sigiriya. Breakfast included hoppers (crepe-like bread) with coconut and jaggery, very yummy.
Our plan was to go to Sigiriya by tuktuk, return to the hotel to pick up our bags, and then go by car to Anuradhapura.
We booked the same tuktuk driver that we had for Pollanaruwa, as he was excellent. Left the hotel at 8am, arriving at Sigirya just before 8:30am.
Sigiriya is a rocky outcrop rising 200m with vertical walls, with the remains of an ancient civilization at the top. It's one of the things that attracted us to Sri Lanka in the first place.
Sigiriya is also the most-visited tourist site in Sri Lanka, and the guide books all suggest climbing early morning. So of course there were 50 million tourists who all left their hotels around 8am to start the climb.
First was the traffic jam getting into the entrance. Next was the 10 minute line up to buy tickets. Then another 10 minute line up to show the ticket to enter.
So finally we were at the start of the climb! Not so fast. It's a narrow paved path, impossible to pass anyone. Tour guides stop their groups in the middle of the path to give their spiel.
It took us over an hour to get to the top, about 10 minutes of actual walking, and the rest waiting. At the top step, the people in front of us stopped to remark, wow, we're at the top and have a short discussion about the climb. Umm, well maybe you're at the top, and the people behind you are waiting for you to move from the top step.
At the top, there's not much to see in terms of ruins. The best viewpoint is an aerial view that you see if you google Sigiriya, which was likely taken from a plane.
So as you can tell we didn't like the excursion. If you're a historian or archeologist it's pretty cool; unfortunately I'm neither. The climb itself is entirely in the shade, it's just at the top where you're in the sun. So you don't need to do the climb at 8am, although it looked just as busy when we left.
Took the tuktuk back to our hotel, had some tea (cause that's what you do in Sri Lanka), switched over to the car, and drove to Anuradhapura.
Our driver had to call the guesthouse a couple times to find it (we've been keeping the hotel phone numbers handy for a few years now, as all the taxi drivers have cell phones). It was in a quiet residential area, the street circling a park area with a pickup cricket game going on in the middle.
We checked in and then took a tuktuk for lunch. First drove by the train station to get reserved seats for our train to Colombo, but it was sold out.
Ate a late lunch at 2pm at Mango Mango, recommended by the guesthouse. It was okay. We relaxed back at the hotel, got served dinner at 6:30pm, way too close after lunch but we hadn't specified a time and I guess that's when the other guests were eating (they had younger kids). At least they had beer, except limited fridge space and so our 2nd beer was warm.
Made plans for a tuktuk driver to take us around the Anuradhapura ruins tomorrow. I had planned two days to see the ruins based on the Lonely Planet but the guesthouse said it would only take four hours. After dinner read up on the city and surrounding area to figure out what to do with the extra day. There were some temples and short climbs that might have interested us at the start of our trip, but we were out-templed so looked at options to get to Colombo a day early.
...
Woke up at 7am for breakfast. Our Colombo hotel had emailed back and they had a room available for us to arrive a day early, so we booked it.
Breakfast was okay at the guesthouse, except for the tea which tasted like it was from teabags circa 1970. It was disappointing after all the great loose-leaf tea we've been having in Sri Lanka.
We asked our tuktuk driver about going by the train station to check for tickets to Colombo on Dec 24th, but he said it would be sold out. Not only did we hit the Christmas rush, it also coincided with Poya (the full moon celebrations). He recommended we catch the 5am train on Dec 24th, with the general admission 2nd class tickets sold the day-of.
So we were off to see the ruins of Anuradhapura, our last bit of touristing on this trip. (We still have Colombo to see, but that's more about souvenirs).
The ruins were cool, not as varied as Pollanaruwa, but worthwhile to see. The Anuradhapura ruins are active religious sites and so we had to take off our shoes at most of them. (Unlike Pollanaruwa which is an archaeological site, and shoes are okay).
The ruins are scattered about a few km. We stopped at about 15-20 sites, including four large dagobas, which take a few minutes each to walk around. That doesn't sound like much effort, but it is when you're barefoot and walking on stones that have been baking in the sun.
We were lucky at one dagoba to see an enormous fabric being carried into the dagoba, to be wrapped around its circumference.
It was a hot day, and we were glad we took at tuktuk rather than renting bicycles for the day. The roads linking the sites are filled with cars, and it's not as obvious where things are, compared to say Pollanaruwa or Bagan, where it was easier to navigate.
After a week of rice and curry for lunch and dinner, we wanted something different, which in Anuradhapura means Pizza Hut (they also have KFC here but we were also out-chickened). The pizzas were close to a pizza from home. We were embarrassed to ask our tuktuk driver to take us to Pizza Hut but oh well.
Arranged with our driver to by picked up at 4:30am the next day to catch our train. Had dinner (rice and curry, not too bad), did a bit of packing, and went to bed.
Our plan was to go to Sigiriya by tuktuk, return to the hotel to pick up our bags, and then go by car to Anuradhapura.
We booked the same tuktuk driver that we had for Pollanaruwa, as he was excellent. Left the hotel at 8am, arriving at Sigirya just before 8:30am.
Sigiriya is a rocky outcrop rising 200m with vertical walls, with the remains of an ancient civilization at the top. It's one of the things that attracted us to Sri Lanka in the first place.
Sigiriya is also the most-visited tourist site in Sri Lanka, and the guide books all suggest climbing early morning. So of course there were 50 million tourists who all left their hotels around 8am to start the climb.
First was the traffic jam getting into the entrance. Next was the 10 minute line up to buy tickets. Then another 10 minute line up to show the ticket to enter.
So finally we were at the start of the climb! Not so fast. It's a narrow paved path, impossible to pass anyone. Tour guides stop their groups in the middle of the path to give their spiel.
It took us over an hour to get to the top, about 10 minutes of actual walking, and the rest waiting. At the top step, the people in front of us stopped to remark, wow, we're at the top and have a short discussion about the climb. Umm, well maybe you're at the top, and the people behind you are waiting for you to move from the top step.
At the top, there's not much to see in terms of ruins. The best viewpoint is an aerial view that you see if you google Sigiriya, which was likely taken from a plane.
So as you can tell we didn't like the excursion. If you're a historian or archeologist it's pretty cool; unfortunately I'm neither. The climb itself is entirely in the shade, it's just at the top where you're in the sun. So you don't need to do the climb at 8am, although it looked just as busy when we left.
Took the tuktuk back to our hotel, had some tea (cause that's what you do in Sri Lanka), switched over to the car, and drove to Anuradhapura.
Our driver had to call the guesthouse a couple times to find it (we've been keeping the hotel phone numbers handy for a few years now, as all the taxi drivers have cell phones). It was in a quiet residential area, the street circling a park area with a pickup cricket game going on in the middle.
We checked in and then took a tuktuk for lunch. First drove by the train station to get reserved seats for our train to Colombo, but it was sold out.
Ate a late lunch at 2pm at Mango Mango, recommended by the guesthouse. It was okay. We relaxed back at the hotel, got served dinner at 6:30pm, way too close after lunch but we hadn't specified a time and I guess that's when the other guests were eating (they had younger kids). At least they had beer, except limited fridge space and so our 2nd beer was warm.
Made plans for a tuktuk driver to take us around the Anuradhapura ruins tomorrow. I had planned two days to see the ruins based on the Lonely Planet but the guesthouse said it would only take four hours. After dinner read up on the city and surrounding area to figure out what to do with the extra day. There were some temples and short climbs that might have interested us at the start of our trip, but we were out-templed so looked at options to get to Colombo a day early.
...
Woke up at 7am for breakfast. Our Colombo hotel had emailed back and they had a room available for us to arrive a day early, so we booked it.
Breakfast was okay at the guesthouse, except for the tea which tasted like it was from teabags circa 1970. It was disappointing after all the great loose-leaf tea we've been having in Sri Lanka.
We asked our tuktuk driver about going by the train station to check for tickets to Colombo on Dec 24th, but he said it would be sold out. Not only did we hit the Christmas rush, it also coincided with Poya (the full moon celebrations). He recommended we catch the 5am train on Dec 24th, with the general admission 2nd class tickets sold the day-of.
So we were off to see the ruins of Anuradhapura, our last bit of touristing on this trip. (We still have Colombo to see, but that's more about souvenirs).
The ruins were cool, not as varied as Pollanaruwa, but worthwhile to see. The Anuradhapura ruins are active religious sites and so we had to take off our shoes at most of them. (Unlike Pollanaruwa which is an archaeological site, and shoes are okay).
The ruins are scattered about a few km. We stopped at about 15-20 sites, including four large dagobas, which take a few minutes each to walk around. That doesn't sound like much effort, but it is when you're barefoot and walking on stones that have been baking in the sun.
We were lucky at one dagoba to see an enormous fabric being carried into the dagoba, to be wrapped around its circumference.
It was a hot day, and we were glad we took at tuktuk rather than renting bicycles for the day. The roads linking the sites are filled with cars, and it's not as obvious where things are, compared to say Pollanaruwa or Bagan, where it was easier to navigate.
After a week of rice and curry for lunch and dinner, we wanted something different, which in Anuradhapura means Pizza Hut (they also have KFC here but we were also out-chickened). The pizzas were close to a pizza from home. We were embarrassed to ask our tuktuk driver to take us to Pizza Hut but oh well.
Arranged with our driver to by picked up at 4:30am the next day to catch our train. Had dinner (rice and curry, not too bad), did a bit of packing, and went to bed.
Monday, December 21, 2015
Habarana, Sri Lanka
We had french toast with treacle for breakfast, a nice break from eggs and toast. Our B&B in Kandy varied the breakfast every day, which was also nice.
We had arranged for a driver to take us from Kandy to Habarana, stopping en route at Dambulla to see the rock caves.
The drive to Dambulla was straight, which was better for Heather's carsickness after the winding roads in Hill Country around Kandy. We stopped for some quick pics at a Hindu temple in Matale, just before Dambulla,which was on the road so we didn't have to make a detour to visit.
The parking lot at the cave temples was large, but not too many cars / buses yet, which boded well. Paid our $15 USD each, and climbed up 166m on a wide staircase where it was easy to pass the slower people.
Just before the cave entrance we removed our shoes (it's a religious site) and left them with the shoe check stand. (The shoe check is primarily for tourists - locals just leave their shoes on the pathside.)
There are five caves, all beside each other on a stretch of rock face. They were all very impressive, filled with large Buddhas over the centuries. Cave II was the largest and most spectacular. This is what I had pictured the caves in Pindaya (in Myanmar) to look like. The Dambulla caves were well worth the visit.
It was only a 30 minute drive from the caves to Habarana. It's not a very big town - more like a junction town that has sprawled out due to its central location to ruins and national parks / safaris.
We stayed at Mutu Village, which our driver had to stop for directions to find. It's down a small road in the forest (as are most places in Habarana). We switched to an upgraded room in the newer wing, which was on the upper floor with a big balcony. Monkeys and squirrels roamed about the trees and roof of the hotel. Mangoes and papaya were in season and were literally falling from the trees. Seriously, it was a concern not to have one fall on your head walking from our room to the dining area.
So as you can imagine it was a great place to relax for the remainder of the day. We only had two errands, quickly completed: go out for lunch, and buy beer. The hotel folks suggested we have the tuktuk driver stop for us to pick up water and beer, which we could store in our mini fridge, and have with dinner.
Dinner was small (the norm in Sri Lanka). The beers were excellent - the freshest we've had in Sri Lanka. Our tuktuk driver had insisted on stopping at different places to buy water and beer - it looks like he knows his stuff :)
...
Breakfast at Mutu Village our first day was a local breakfast, but it did include hoppers (a rice flour and coconut milk crepe-like bread) and omelette, which we ate.
We left the hotel at 8:30am with our tuktuk driver to start our touristing of Pollanaruwa. It was about an hour by tuktuk to the ticket office. Our driver was great at explaining how to avoid the would-be guides and touts, and exactly where to go and what to see.
Tickets were $25 USD each, but well worth it as we found out.
The ruins are spread out over a few km, and follow an easy south-to-north path. The ruins start of in the south with relatively minor ruins, and get progressively more impressive as you head north. I had no idea, even with the research I had done booking the trip, that the ruins in Pollanaruwa were so great. They rank up there with the top ruin collections in the world, not in the top tier with Angkor Wat or Bagan, but definitely in the next tier, with say Jerash. They're really cool.
Anyways, five hours later I was duly impressed. We had lunch at a tourist place overlooking a rice field, and then back to the hotel, exhausted from the day of touring in the heat. Heather was so tired she managed to fall asleep in the back of the tuktuk.
Dinner was good, and we finished our beers and went to bed.
We had arranged for a driver to take us from Kandy to Habarana, stopping en route at Dambulla to see the rock caves.
The drive to Dambulla was straight, which was better for Heather's carsickness after the winding roads in Hill Country around Kandy. We stopped for some quick pics at a Hindu temple in Matale, just before Dambulla,which was on the road so we didn't have to make a detour to visit.
The parking lot at the cave temples was large, but not too many cars / buses yet, which boded well. Paid our $15 USD each, and climbed up 166m on a wide staircase where it was easy to pass the slower people.
Just before the cave entrance we removed our shoes (it's a religious site) and left them with the shoe check stand. (The shoe check is primarily for tourists - locals just leave their shoes on the pathside.)
There are five caves, all beside each other on a stretch of rock face. They were all very impressive, filled with large Buddhas over the centuries. Cave II was the largest and most spectacular. This is what I had pictured the caves in Pindaya (in Myanmar) to look like. The Dambulla caves were well worth the visit.
It was only a 30 minute drive from the caves to Habarana. It's not a very big town - more like a junction town that has sprawled out due to its central location to ruins and national parks / safaris.
We stayed at Mutu Village, which our driver had to stop for directions to find. It's down a small road in the forest (as are most places in Habarana). We switched to an upgraded room in the newer wing, which was on the upper floor with a big balcony. Monkeys and squirrels roamed about the trees and roof of the hotel. Mangoes and papaya were in season and were literally falling from the trees. Seriously, it was a concern not to have one fall on your head walking from our room to the dining area.
So as you can imagine it was a great place to relax for the remainder of the day. We only had two errands, quickly completed: go out for lunch, and buy beer. The hotel folks suggested we have the tuktuk driver stop for us to pick up water and beer, which we could store in our mini fridge, and have with dinner.
Dinner was small (the norm in Sri Lanka). The beers were excellent - the freshest we've had in Sri Lanka. Our tuktuk driver had insisted on stopping at different places to buy water and beer - it looks like he knows his stuff :)
...
Breakfast at Mutu Village our first day was a local breakfast, but it did include hoppers (a rice flour and coconut milk crepe-like bread) and omelette, which we ate.
We left the hotel at 8:30am with our tuktuk driver to start our touristing of Pollanaruwa. It was about an hour by tuktuk to the ticket office. Our driver was great at explaining how to avoid the would-be guides and touts, and exactly where to go and what to see.
Tickets were $25 USD each, but well worth it as we found out.
The ruins are spread out over a few km, and follow an easy south-to-north path. The ruins start of in the south with relatively minor ruins, and get progressively more impressive as you head north. I had no idea, even with the research I had done booking the trip, that the ruins in Pollanaruwa were so great. They rank up there with the top ruin collections in the world, not in the top tier with Angkor Wat or Bagan, but definitely in the next tier, with say Jerash. They're really cool.
Anyways, five hours later I was duly impressed. We had lunch at a tourist place overlooking a rice field, and then back to the hotel, exhausted from the day of touring in the heat. Heather was so tired she managed to fall asleep in the back of the tuktuk.
Dinner was good, and we finished our beers and went to bed.
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Kandy, Sri Lanka
We had a day full of sitting in a car today, driving out to Nuwara Eliya, through beautiful scenery of tea plantations in Hill Country.
We had the same private driver (that drove us here from the south) pick us up around 8am. It was about a 90 minute drive to Glenloch Tea Factory, the tea plantation that our B&B had recommended. Got the standard tourist tour, which was similar to what we saw in Malaysia, except there was more production going on. There weren't any tea leaf pickers on the estate so had the driver stop along the rest of the way whenever I saw some pickers.
The hill country was beautiful to drive through. I suppose the train ride is equally great.
It rained on-and-off after we visited the tea plantation, but we were in the car so it didn't matter. Stopped briefly in Nuwara Eliya, and at a Bhuddist temple that was closed between puja, otherwise a rather sedentary day.
We had dinner at the B&B. Went up (the house was on a hillside, with the entrance at the top level, and the other floors descending below into the valley) for a drink around 7pm. Patrick was pouring Johnnie Walker Black Label scotch, "cause it was Christmas".
Dinner was excellent, Sri Lankan, with rice and curry and vegetable dishes. Best was the dessert, curds and treacle, but this was the kind of curd you'd get from an organic curd specialty store. And treacle is always good. Mmm.
We had the same private driver (that drove us here from the south) pick us up around 8am. It was about a 90 minute drive to Glenloch Tea Factory, the tea plantation that our B&B had recommended. Got the standard tourist tour, which was similar to what we saw in Malaysia, except there was more production going on. There weren't any tea leaf pickers on the estate so had the driver stop along the rest of the way whenever I saw some pickers.
The hill country was beautiful to drive through. I suppose the train ride is equally great.
It rained on-and-off after we visited the tea plantation, but we were in the car so it didn't matter. Stopped briefly in Nuwara Eliya, and at a Bhuddist temple that was closed between puja, otherwise a rather sedentary day.
We had dinner at the B&B. Went up (the house was on a hillside, with the entrance at the top level, and the other floors descending below into the valley) for a drink around 7pm. Patrick was pouring Johnnie Walker Black Label scotch, "cause it was Christmas".
Dinner was excellent, Sri Lankan, with rice and curry and vegetable dishes. Best was the dessert, curds and treacle, but this was the kind of curd you'd get from an organic curd specialty store. And treacle is always good. Mmm.
Friday, December 18, 2015
Kandy, Sri Lanka
We took a private driver from Kamburugamuwa to Kandy, our longest travel day of the Sri Lanka trip. The folks at the Imagine Villa said normally people would break the journey into two, going by train via Ella. The train ride from Ella towards Kandy is supposed to be really scenic.
Anyways I had booked our hotels back in June (as it's busy season now), and the LP had said it was a seven hour train ride from Matara to Kandy, which sounded okay. What the LP didn't mention is that there's two ways to go, the scenic (long) way, or the fast way going back through Colombo. I thought it was seven hours for the scenic route.
We didn't fancy seven hours in 2nd class going back through Colombo, so instead booked the private driver. The fast route by car takes the new (finished in 2013) highway, and about five hours. We booked the driver though the Kandy B&B cause they quoted us a much cheaper rate.
We arrived in Kandy around 12:30pm. Heather said that over our trips, we've now visited Sucre, Salt and Kandy.
We stayed at Hantana Range View, a B&B run by an older couple that reminded me of some of my parents' friends. It had a great view overlooking Kandy.
We had the obligatory tea, which was excellent. Patrick had worked in the tea industry for 45 years, with Patrick and his wife Francis living in estate houses on the tea plantations. A long way to say, they knew their tea. They favoured BOP from a particular estate (I forget which one), served very properly from a white ceramic tea pot, at just the perfect temperature and steepness (degree of steep? steepidity?)
We hadn't had lunch, and also hadn't counted on having the afternoon free (we had been told the drive could take all day). So took a tuktuk into the centre of town, and found a restaurant for lunch, Midland Cafe. Turns out this is place rates highly on tripadvisor, we stumbled across it. Had the rice and curry, which was good, and inexpensive.
There was a sweet shop across the street, so we treated ourselves to some burfi, (an Indian sweet), and a "Lipton tea". Unlike Myanmar, where a Lipton tea meant a black tea, in this place it was sort of a Nespresso for tea, with instant chai-in-a-cup.
Well fed and on a sugar high, we walked around a bit of downtown, scouting out the sites to see the next day. Also stopped into a couple souvenir shops.
The B&B had lent us a cell phone, so that we could call the tuktuk driver to pick us up. Cleaned up back at the hotel, and then went back into town for dinner. Kandy is mostly a dry town, with only tourist hotel restaurants serving alcohol, so we went to the Royal Hotel for dinner. We found out later that the hotel had once been owned by Patrick's grandfather, and only recently purchased and restored. We felt transported back to a colonial era. The food was okay. The staff were very eager, but had no clue. Anyways, we were there for the atmosphere which was great.
...
We had breakfast at the B&B (i suppose otherwise it would just be a B), and then took a tuktuk into town. Visited the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic. They have three periods a day where the relic is open for viewing (and prayers and offerings) called puja. We timed our visit for the 9:30am puja.
There was a large lineup of devotees already there. We joined the throngs, squeezing into queue and shuffling past the relic. You don't actually see the tooth (it's inside multiple caskets), but it's more about the experience of seeing all the devotees.
Next was the World Buddhism Museum. It's part of the temple complex, and so it's the first time I've visited a museum barefoot.
The museum was excellent. It showed the evolution of Buddhism through the world, and had exhibits from many countries. We were surprised by how many we had already seen, although our reasons were for the ruins. The museum was very extensive, we spent almost two hours there.
Had lunch at the Olde Empire Cafe, which was targeted at tourists, which suited us fine as we wanted the use a clean washroom.
We then took a tuktuk to the botanical gardens. It was pricey to enter ($11 each vs 50 cents for locals) (a lot of sites in Sri Lanka are priced much higher for tourist). We've seen a lot of botanical gardens recently - in Myanmar, Singapore, and now here. There was some cool stuff, the best was the cannonball tree. It was a nice refreshing walk around.
Just as we were leaving the gardens, it started to rain. Got a random tuktuk, except we didn't have an address or phone number. I knew the way by sight, but the driver took a different main road. Aargh. Also we had the rain covers on the tuktuk so we had very little visibility. Ended up back in the centre, so decided to walk back from there as we knew the way.
It was now pouring, and our little fold-up umbrellas kept our head and shoulders dry, but that's about it. We were soaked by the time we reached the B&B, but we had to launder our clothes anyways so it didn't matter. The only thing was our shoes were soaked too. I had my big hiking shoes and Heather had her flats, so we had shoes we could wear for dinner.
We tried another place for dinner, Senani, recommended by Frances. It was overlooking the lake and temple, and we got the last railing-front table. The wait staff here was much better. We were still full from lunch, so just split the deviled cashews (which were excellent) and the chicken biryani. We arranged a pickup time with the hotel tuktuk so we had no issues getting back home :)
Anyways I had booked our hotels back in June (as it's busy season now), and the LP had said it was a seven hour train ride from Matara to Kandy, which sounded okay. What the LP didn't mention is that there's two ways to go, the scenic (long) way, or the fast way going back through Colombo. I thought it was seven hours for the scenic route.
We didn't fancy seven hours in 2nd class going back through Colombo, so instead booked the private driver. The fast route by car takes the new (finished in 2013) highway, and about five hours. We booked the driver though the Kandy B&B cause they quoted us a much cheaper rate.
We arrived in Kandy around 12:30pm. Heather said that over our trips, we've now visited Sucre, Salt and Kandy.
We stayed at Hantana Range View, a B&B run by an older couple that reminded me of some of my parents' friends. It had a great view overlooking Kandy.
We had the obligatory tea, which was excellent. Patrick had worked in the tea industry for 45 years, with Patrick and his wife Francis living in estate houses on the tea plantations. A long way to say, they knew their tea. They favoured BOP from a particular estate (I forget which one), served very properly from a white ceramic tea pot, at just the perfect temperature and steepness (degree of steep? steepidity?)
We hadn't had lunch, and also hadn't counted on having the afternoon free (we had been told the drive could take all day). So took a tuktuk into the centre of town, and found a restaurant for lunch, Midland Cafe. Turns out this is place rates highly on tripadvisor, we stumbled across it. Had the rice and curry, which was good, and inexpensive.
There was a sweet shop across the street, so we treated ourselves to some burfi, (an Indian sweet), and a "Lipton tea". Unlike Myanmar, where a Lipton tea meant a black tea, in this place it was sort of a Nespresso for tea, with instant chai-in-a-cup.
Well fed and on a sugar high, we walked around a bit of downtown, scouting out the sites to see the next day. Also stopped into a couple souvenir shops.
The B&B had lent us a cell phone, so that we could call the tuktuk driver to pick us up. Cleaned up back at the hotel, and then went back into town for dinner. Kandy is mostly a dry town, with only tourist hotel restaurants serving alcohol, so we went to the Royal Hotel for dinner. We found out later that the hotel had once been owned by Patrick's grandfather, and only recently purchased and restored. We felt transported back to a colonial era. The food was okay. The staff were very eager, but had no clue. Anyways, we were there for the atmosphere which was great.
...
We had breakfast at the B&B (i suppose otherwise it would just be a B), and then took a tuktuk into town. Visited the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic. They have three periods a day where the relic is open for viewing (and prayers and offerings) called puja. We timed our visit for the 9:30am puja.
There was a large lineup of devotees already there. We joined the throngs, squeezing into queue and shuffling past the relic. You don't actually see the tooth (it's inside multiple caskets), but it's more about the experience of seeing all the devotees.
Next was the World Buddhism Museum. It's part of the temple complex, and so it's the first time I've visited a museum barefoot.
The museum was excellent. It showed the evolution of Buddhism through the world, and had exhibits from many countries. We were surprised by how many we had already seen, although our reasons were for the ruins. The museum was very extensive, we spent almost two hours there.
Had lunch at the Olde Empire Cafe, which was targeted at tourists, which suited us fine as we wanted the use a clean washroom.
We then took a tuktuk to the botanical gardens. It was pricey to enter ($11 each vs 50 cents for locals) (a lot of sites in Sri Lanka are priced much higher for tourist). We've seen a lot of botanical gardens recently - in Myanmar, Singapore, and now here. There was some cool stuff, the best was the cannonball tree. It was a nice refreshing walk around.
Just as we were leaving the gardens, it started to rain. Got a random tuktuk, except we didn't have an address or phone number. I knew the way by sight, but the driver took a different main road. Aargh. Also we had the rain covers on the tuktuk so we had very little visibility. Ended up back in the centre, so decided to walk back from there as we knew the way.
It was now pouring, and our little fold-up umbrellas kept our head and shoulders dry, but that's about it. We were soaked by the time we reached the B&B, but we had to launder our clothes anyways so it didn't matter. The only thing was our shoes were soaked too. I had my big hiking shoes and Heather had her flats, so we had shoes we could wear for dinner.
We tried another place for dinner, Senani, recommended by Frances. It was overlooking the lake and temple, and we got the last railing-front table. The wait staff here was much better. We were still full from lunch, so just split the deviled cashews (which were excellent) and the chicken biryani. We arranged a pickup time with the hotel tuktuk so we had no issues getting back home :)
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Kamburugamuwa, Sri Lanka
I had booked with Scuba Diving Weligama to go diving today, but the weather was really stormy when I woke up, so I called to cancel. The dive itself would have been fine, but I didn't like the idea of being in dive boat in the choppy seas. Plus there had been thunder and lightning all night, and forecast to continue through the morning. Heather said the thunder was shaking the ground; I slept right through it.
It was cooler in the morning with the heavy cloud cover, a nice break from the heat. We had breakfast on the porch as usual, and then read our books for a bit.
Around 11am we started to get antsy and decided to get a tuktuk to go into town for a couple hours.
First we went back to Mirissa for lunch. I had chicken roti, Heather tried the kotu, which is roti chopped up with vegetables and other fillings. The rotis were made to order, and really fresh.
Next to the east of our hotel to Matara. It's a transportation hub for the region and there was way more traffic. There's a couple small forts to see, and we just wanted to walk around the town a bit.
The forts were okay, one was really small, the other was under renovations. But we stumbled across the local food market which we really enjoyed.
Walked across the pedestrian bridge to see the temple on a small island, but didn't want to take our shoes off and get our feet dirty, so just looked at it from the outside.
Met up with our tuktuk driver at the temple as planned, and went back to the hotel. Matara was a nice little excursion to while away the day. Jumped in the pool to cool down.
We chatted with the owners while having a sundowner. They offered us a drink on the house so both of us had the daiquiris that Heather liked the other day :)
For dinner we had the fish special. I can't remember the type of fish, except that neither of us had had it before. It was okay. Dessert was a repeat of our first day, and very tasty as usual.
It was cooler in the morning with the heavy cloud cover, a nice break from the heat. We had breakfast on the porch as usual, and then read our books for a bit.
Around 11am we started to get antsy and decided to get a tuktuk to go into town for a couple hours.
First we went back to Mirissa for lunch. I had chicken roti, Heather tried the kotu, which is roti chopped up with vegetables and other fillings. The rotis were made to order, and really fresh.
Next to the east of our hotel to Matara. It's a transportation hub for the region and there was way more traffic. There's a couple small forts to see, and we just wanted to walk around the town a bit.
The forts were okay, one was really small, the other was under renovations. But we stumbled across the local food market which we really enjoyed.
Walked across the pedestrian bridge to see the temple on a small island, but didn't want to take our shoes off and get our feet dirty, so just looked at it from the outside.
Met up with our tuktuk driver at the temple as planned, and went back to the hotel. Matara was a nice little excursion to while away the day. Jumped in the pool to cool down.
We chatted with the owners while having a sundowner. They offered us a drink on the house so both of us had the daiquiris that Heather liked the other day :)
For dinner we had the fish special. I can't remember the type of fish, except that neither of us had had it before. It was okay. Dessert was a repeat of our first day, and very tasty as usual.
Tuesday, December 15, 2015
Kamburugamuwa, Sri Lanka
We were up early to be ready for the tuktuk that was picking us up at 6:15am for the whale watching excursion.
It was a quick 15 minute drive to Mirissa harbour. We zipped through the fishing boats unloading their catches, and selling the fish on the docks. It looked pretty cool, but we had bigger fish to fry (haha).
We paid our $60 each and boarded the whale watching boat. It was about 50% full, with a steady stream of tourists arriving by tuktuk. The boat had a covered upper deck, where we grabbed two seats. Staff came by with tea and ginger cookies for everyone, and also Gravol for those who wanted it.
By the time we left at 7am, the top deck was rather crowded. It was hard to keep an eye on the horizon with all the tourists standing at the railing. Fortunately the sea was pretty calm.
We headed straight south for at least an hour. No blue whales, but there were a few dolphins that most of the other tourists rushed to one side of the boat to get a glimpse, obviously not understanding the physics of a floating boat. It was going to be a long excursion...
The blue whales are hit-and-miss in the Indian Ocean and we had a miss day. After a few hours of puttering about looking for blue whales, we finally headed back to land.
On the way back, we had the misfortune of spotting some right whales. That meant another hour of circling around, with most of the tourists doing their inadvertent best to tip the boat. Heather and I just wanted to get back to ashore, and go for lunch.
Finally around 2pm, we got back to the harbour. We both agreed it was one of the least enjoyable excursions ever.
Our tuktuk driver took us back to our hotel, where we had a late breakfast. (The hotel does breakfasts made-to-order, and serve you breakfast after a whale watching excursion, no matter how late you get back). It was a plentiful breakfast, although about average taste: fruit platter, eggs, assorted breads, yoghurt (not plain :( ), cheeses. It was also the first place that didn't have loose leaf tea.
Booked the fish special for dinner, and then relaxed around the hotel. It's one of the few places where the wifi doesn't reach the room, so we had to hang out in the common areas to surf.
For the sundowner, Heather tried the hotel specialty, a cocktail based on arrak, a local distilled alcohol from coconut. It was excellent. I stuck to my beer.
The fish special was also really good, pan-fried barracuda in a penne pasta with lemongrass sauce. Mmm good. Dessert was amazing, a molten chocolate brownie with vanilla ice cream.
...
We were up even earlier the next morning, at 5:10am so that we could get to Mirissa harbour in time to see the fishing boats come in. We had driven through the fish market yesterday on the way to the whale watching excursion, which turned out to be the best part of the excursion, so decided to get up early just to see it on its own.
Dawn was just starting to break when we arrived at Mirissa harbour. There was a 50 cents entrance fee (we didn't have to pay that yesterday cause we were just passing through).
It was pretty cool to wander about taking pictures, mostly just trying not to get in the way. The fishermen were helpful when we asked about the type of fish. At first they didn't understand the question, but if we just pointed and said "tuna?" they'd tell us the actual name. The biggest were the yellow fin tuna, which we recognized by the yellow fin (oddly enough). There was no smell at all of fish - it was fresh from the ocean. Buyers and sellers bartered and selected their fish, weighed and then sometimes carted away in wheelbarrows, depending on how much they bought.
Around 7am we headed back to the hotel, and had our breakfast. We then walked down the beach to a point about a km away, before it got too hot outside. The south coast of Sri Lanka is favoured by surfers, as there was constant pounding of large waves. We had a friendly dog follow us the whole way, just like trekking in Bhutan.
Somehow it was already 11ish and so we had lunch. It was sandwiches and fries again, not very exciting. With the great dinners, we had hoped for better lunches, but oh well.
Napped / read / daydreamed away the afternoon. Had some drinks at sundown - Heather tried another cocktail, a coconut daiquiri, which was one of the better daiquiris she's had. My beer was also good. This hotel didn't have coolies so they poured out a glass, and then kept the bottle in fridge until I was ready for the 2nd half.
We had the grilled seafood platter again, which our resident seafood expert (Heather) said wasn't quite as fresh as the first time we had it. It was still pretty good though. Dessert was a pineapple slice inside a banana fritter, topped with vanilla ice cream. Mmm good yet again. There were more mosquitos out tonight so we called it a night early.
It was a quick 15 minute drive to Mirissa harbour. We zipped through the fishing boats unloading their catches, and selling the fish on the docks. It looked pretty cool, but we had bigger fish to fry (haha).
We paid our $60 each and boarded the whale watching boat. It was about 50% full, with a steady stream of tourists arriving by tuktuk. The boat had a covered upper deck, where we grabbed two seats. Staff came by with tea and ginger cookies for everyone, and also Gravol for those who wanted it.
By the time we left at 7am, the top deck was rather crowded. It was hard to keep an eye on the horizon with all the tourists standing at the railing. Fortunately the sea was pretty calm.
We headed straight south for at least an hour. No blue whales, but there were a few dolphins that most of the other tourists rushed to one side of the boat to get a glimpse, obviously not understanding the physics of a floating boat. It was going to be a long excursion...
The blue whales are hit-and-miss in the Indian Ocean and we had a miss day. After a few hours of puttering about looking for blue whales, we finally headed back to land.
On the way back, we had the misfortune of spotting some right whales. That meant another hour of circling around, with most of the tourists doing their inadvertent best to tip the boat. Heather and I just wanted to get back to ashore, and go for lunch.
Finally around 2pm, we got back to the harbour. We both agreed it was one of the least enjoyable excursions ever.
Our tuktuk driver took us back to our hotel, where we had a late breakfast. (The hotel does breakfasts made-to-order, and serve you breakfast after a whale watching excursion, no matter how late you get back). It was a plentiful breakfast, although about average taste: fruit platter, eggs, assorted breads, yoghurt (not plain :( ), cheeses. It was also the first place that didn't have loose leaf tea.
Booked the fish special for dinner, and then relaxed around the hotel. It's one of the few places where the wifi doesn't reach the room, so we had to hang out in the common areas to surf.
For the sundowner, Heather tried the hotel specialty, a cocktail based on arrak, a local distilled alcohol from coconut. It was excellent. I stuck to my beer.
The fish special was also really good, pan-fried barracuda in a penne pasta with lemongrass sauce. Mmm good. Dessert was amazing, a molten chocolate brownie with vanilla ice cream.
...
We were up even earlier the next morning, at 5:10am so that we could get to Mirissa harbour in time to see the fishing boats come in. We had driven through the fish market yesterday on the way to the whale watching excursion, which turned out to be the best part of the excursion, so decided to get up early just to see it on its own.
Dawn was just starting to break when we arrived at Mirissa harbour. There was a 50 cents entrance fee (we didn't have to pay that yesterday cause we were just passing through).
It was pretty cool to wander about taking pictures, mostly just trying not to get in the way. The fishermen were helpful when we asked about the type of fish. At first they didn't understand the question, but if we just pointed and said "tuna?" they'd tell us the actual name. The biggest were the yellow fin tuna, which we recognized by the yellow fin (oddly enough). There was no smell at all of fish - it was fresh from the ocean. Buyers and sellers bartered and selected their fish, weighed and then sometimes carted away in wheelbarrows, depending on how much they bought.
Around 7am we headed back to the hotel, and had our breakfast. We then walked down the beach to a point about a km away, before it got too hot outside. The south coast of Sri Lanka is favoured by surfers, as there was constant pounding of large waves. We had a friendly dog follow us the whole way, just like trekking in Bhutan.
Somehow it was already 11ish and so we had lunch. It was sandwiches and fries again, not very exciting. With the great dinners, we had hoped for better lunches, but oh well.
Napped / read / daydreamed away the afternoon. Had some drinks at sundown - Heather tried another cocktail, a coconut daiquiri, which was one of the better daiquiris she's had. My beer was also good. This hotel didn't have coolies so they poured out a glass, and then kept the bottle in fridge until I was ready for the 2nd half.
We had the grilled seafood platter again, which our resident seafood expert (Heather) said wasn't quite as fresh as the first time we had it. It was still pretty good though. Dessert was a pineapple slice inside a banana fritter, topped with vanilla ice cream. Mmm good yet again. There were more mosquitos out tonight so we called it a night early.
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