Food and Travel Secrets Shares Sri Lanka Highlights

Sri Lanka is a delightful country to visit with the most wonderful food, interesting places to stay and welcoming locals. Full of colour, history and diverse spots to explore it’s easy to plan a great Sri Lanka holiday yourself with just a few good tips. I have travelled there twice and loved it. Since then I’ve paid keen attention to the feedback of others to hone some must dos and must stays to share with you.

  

Mkae good use of the Lonely Planet Guide for Sri Lanks and do know that prices often have additional taxes added when you pay.

Tip 1 Book your Driver with Sri Lanka Wide Tours

These guys are fabulous! I have used them twice myself for a group of 10 as well as a girls trip with two. I’ve had great feedback from seven other groups of family and friends who have used them too.

It’s a well run, good value family business that genuinely takes care of you. Darshana in the office can help you plan your trip if you let him know what you’re interested in. We’ve all been great fans of Danushka as a driver, so do ask if Danushka is free to take you. But Danushka’s dad and Dameeka have been great drivers too. It’s worked out for us at about $70 a day for a car with good seatbelts and a careful driver. Sri Lanka can be tricky without a driver as the public transport is reportedly not as good as in India or other parts of Asia. I’ve found travel can be very slow even though the distances are short. I always book my own hotels but Darshana helps me with the rest.

Tip 2 Travel by Train through the Tea Plantations

Having said that, is is great to travel by train in the hills. The scenery is wonderful and the driver can meet you at the station. Ask your driver to help you organise tickets.

The trip from Nuwara Eliya to Ella is a good leg, although I think you can also travel from Kandy to Nuwara Eliya.

Tip 3 Head to the Hill County

Kandy

There’s a wonderful part of Sri Lanka in the centre that grows the world’s best tea, plentiful vegetables and has great walks and scenery.

Kandy has a culture all of it’s own and….

….a lovely lake….

……good Kandyan drummers and dancers performances (your driver can help you get tickets)…

 

….. great botanical gardens…

……and I loved the central market where we made a great friend, Jabar who shares a Canberra connection. If you visit do drop by and say hello!

The Queens Hotel is hard to beat. It’s a heritage hotel, in the top location next to the lake and Temple of the Tooth and close walking distance to the sights, shopping and restaurants.

It has a nice pool, good breakfast and dinner buffet, nice antique bar and elevator.

But more recently it seemed to cater for more groups so there may now be other options equally as good. Villa 49 was also in my shortlist and is down near the lake too. Just be aware that hillside accommodation is less accessible to eateries and sights.

Ella

Tip 4 Don’t Miss the Southern Beaches

Mirissa

There’s plenty of beaches to choose from but we loved Mirissa and staying at The Spice House was my favourite accomodation. Gorgeous grounds, pool, breakfast and meals and lovely hosts in Phil and Wathsala.

The best rooms when we were there were the Star Anise, Lemongrass Room, Clove Cabin and Pepper Cottage. But I can see thar now there are new Spice Villas that look lovely too like Ginger and Chilli.

 

Choose your fish on the beach and get it cooked for dinner.

Do take a day trip to Jungle Beach too.

Tip 5 Don’t Miss Galle

The old fort of Galle is just fabulous. Stay in the fort if you can.

Not far from the fort is Kikili House  which is a real experience too with Henri your ultimate host.

Tip 6 Stay at Heritage Properties, Heritance Hotels and Geoffrey Bawa Designed Properties

You can’t go wrong staying at hotels designed by famous Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa. The Heritance Kandalama in Dambulla is a Bawa property in the area near Sigiriya. It’s is wonderful.

 

The Heritance Group also runs the Tea Factory in Nuwara Eliya which I’ve heard is good.

While Colombo is not the highest spot on most people’s itinerary, if you do stay there the Galle Face Hotel is gorgeous.

 

Tip 7 West Coast Highlights

If you are travelling from Galle back to the airport consider going along the west coast if you do have some time.

Do visit Beven Bawa’s beautifully home Brief. He was Geoffrey Bawa’s brother and a garden designer.

Also call in at the puppet museum…

….. and the Tsunami museum as your guide is likely to be someone who has lived through the experince and the visit is just so moving.

Tip 8 Enjoy Fabulous Sri Lankan Foods

‘Don’t miss’ Sri Lankan foods

Kottu Roti

Lamprais

Hoppers

Curry and Rice

String hoppers (have with curry)

Buffalo curd and treacle

You’ll find great curd and treacle on the road between Ella and Mirissa.

Puttu

Wattalappam

Shopping

I didn’t find so much to buy in Sri Lanka, but do stock up on tea and I loved the colourful bedsheets with pillow covers the make amaziing table cloths and napkins!

 Ancient Sites

I can’t say much about the ancient sites, having only visited Sigiriya (Lion Rock) which is probably the most accessible if you’re heading to the central hill country.

Kerala Add-On

Before visiting Sri Lanka, I’ve also spent a week or two in Kerala near by in Southern India. It’s only a one hour flight from Trivandrum in southern Kerala to Colombo, so well worth considering if you have the time. Flying into Kochi, visiting the Kerala backwaters and the coast (love Varkala) works well. The tea growing hill country is close by too.

Tours

It’s also worth checking out the trip notes for the Intrepid Sri Lanka tours for more ideas. I have heard good things about the Intrepid Circle Sri Lanka tour, but really there’s not a need for a tour if you use Sri Lanka Wide tours as your driver. Better to invest in great accommodation I think.