Tag: galle

Galle and Ella

Saw my first international sporting event in Galle — part of the test cricket match between New Zealand and Sri Lanka. I understood some of it. The stadium is brilliantly located, with views of the ocean and fort. The fort ramparts have their own views of the stadium, which many were taking advantage of.

Torrential rain made my slog to the bus stand at 5 a.m. the next morning less fun. I was thoroughly soaked by the time I made it to the Badulla bus, and continued that way until after arriving in Ella around 8 hours later. However, I found the amazing Rainbow Inn guest house, which made things better with sensational home-cooked Sri Lankan food. After generally lazing around and hiding from the rain yesterday, I took the beautiful walk up to “Little Adam’s Peak” today and enjoyed the views of Ella Gap, including the hair-raising roads I’d traveled the day before. The hills and valleys are quite beautiful here, and the weather is cool enough at night to sleep without a fan.

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Tomorrow morning, I’ll take the train to Nuwara Eliya (an old hill station and even colder), where I’ll spend a night before moving on to Kandy on my way out of the country.

Pushkar, Mahipalpur, Colombo, Galle

Pushkar was in sad shape, as the lake all its temples surround has been replaced by a mostly-dry trash pit. There was delicious health food to be had, though.

I stayed in the “Eurostar International” hotel near the Delhi airport — completely clean with a fair price for airport transfers and generally a phenomenal value at Rs. 1430 nett. Nearby was Coco’s, the food counter section of a spotless and well-air-conditioned Korean grocery, where I had a “combo” of mostly-onion veggie pizza and a piece of (American-style) fried chicken.

New Terminal 1D at DEL is a standard new airport terminal, with check-in islands and lines which weren’t so terrible at 5 a.m. I think it’s supposed to be given over exclusively to low-cost carriers after the “real” new domestic terminal is finished, which almost makes the use of bus to plane transfers forgivable.

Flights were fine. In Bangalore’s airport, which was sadly lacking in concessions but otherwise a standard new-ish place, I walked by a Kingfisher sports bar before being offered a can of Kingfisher lager on my Kingfisher flight to Colombo.

I have been enjoying Sri Lanka so far — navigating the roadblocks and literal police state in Colombo can be trying, but the city is much less squalid than I’ve become used to recently. I had a lovely long walk between Galle Face Green and the ocean when I arrived, with cool breezes and cooler rain making me very happy.

I’m now in Galle fort, which is nice enough. One thing I’ve particularly enjoyed about Sri Lanka is that the touts have turned it down several notches from Delhi. I’m planning to make it to the nearby beaches, if it stays nice, and then figure out how to get up through the Hill Country before I leave in the early morning hours of the 25th for Hong Kong via KL.