Heading to Sri Lanka

Sri Lankan history

Basking in the shadow of its much larger neighbour to the north, tear drop shaped Sri Lanka has a rich and turbulent history. Colonised by the Portuguese, then the Dutch, before it was taken by the British and called Ceylon, a name many of you will associate with tea,

Sri Lanka is now a very proud independent nation, becoming a republic in 1972 and it was about to become the 54th country I’ve visited. 

In the years since, the island has been ravaged by a civil war that lasted for 25 years, ending only as recently as 2009. Many thousands of lives were lost in the fighting and it is little wonder that Sri Lanka has taken time to process the trauma.

Easter Sunday Terrorist Attacks in Colombo

Further devastation was to hit in the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks in 2019, with a number of tourist hotels targetted by suicide bombers. Across the city of Colombo, Sri Lanka’s capital, 269 people lost their lives, many of them tourists staying at the Shangri-La, The Kingsbury, and the Cinnamon Grand 5 star hotels. Not aware of the history at the time, we were to visit the Cinnamon Grand for a few cold beers on the last day of our travels in Sri Lanka.

As if they hadn’t been through enough, the country suffered an economic crisis that lasted from 2019 to December 2024. Potentially triggered by the terrorist attacks and then exacerbated by the COVID19 pandemic, the crisis resulted in unprecedented levels of inflation and electricity and fuel shortages.

It seems disaster is never far away in Sri Lanka, something we were to discover for ourselves in the very first week of our travels around the island.

Holiday Tradition

Our holiday started in the traditional way, with pre-flight drinks at the airport. A newly renovated Perth International terminal. It almost feels like the airport is entering the modern era. 

Our flight from Singapore landed in Colombo at around 11.30pm and we were shattered. Travelling from Perth, through Singapore (sadly bypassing one of my favourite cities again), and onto Sri Lanka had us turning our clocks back by two and half hours. Which meant our body clocks were now wondering why we weren’t tucked up in bed.

Clearing immigration was a breeze due to completing our electronic visas before leaving Perth. All we had to do now was negotiate a very busy South Asian airport as we neared midnight. Walking through arrivals to a cacophony of sound, and way more people than I expected for this time of the evening, I was still trying to process why we had to meet our hotel pick up driver at the post office.

“Head towards the post office”, were possibly some of the strangest instructions I had received when landing at an airport in the middle of the night.

Arriving in Sri Lanka

It soon became clear that this is where everyone got told to meet their driver. Colombo airport, officially called Bandaranaike International Airport, is rather small, and as you exit the arrival hall, into the street, turning left has you at a large blue facade, which through the day operates as the post office. In fact, it looked as though it was still open with a uniformed employee sitting behind the glass screen. After a What’s App exchange using my esim and a short wait we were soon in the minivan with one other female traveller, and her surf board, for our overnight stay at Kynrock Hotel, mere minutes from the airport. As we were not visiting Colombo until the end of our travels we opted for a hotel very close to the airport rather than taking a taxi for the one hour trip into the city.

Morning broke bright and sunny with the sounds of many foreign accents. It turns out we had a very large delegation from the Indian Red Cross staying in the hotel and they do love a “good morning” greeting, so much so that the noise from the corridor, “good morning” on repeat, acted as our alarm clock. As I always travel with fresh coffee it was a well needed strong black coffee that got my engines going for the day.

First Breakfast in Sri Lanka

With a rumbling stomach, and enticing aromas wafting down the corridor, we went in search of breakfast options. Our only option turned out to be a very expensive $12 AUD (2,494 rupee) for the “Indian breakfast”. My first chicken curry of the trip and it was delicious. A side dish of daal and a spicy Sri Lankan omelette and I was all set up for a travel day. 

We had researched the many ways of travelling around the island, and for the very first day we decided to do what many do, and that is to take a taxi. The thought of a three hour taxi ride would seem ludicrous at home, it would be like getting a taxi to Margaret River, but here in Sri Lanka a lot of locals make their living through these long taxi rides.

Sri Lankan Taxis

Through the local Pick Me app, Sri Lanka’s version of Grab/Uber, we soon had a car en route to collect us. What turned up was a completely different car, and driver, to the one in the app. However, he knew who he was picking up, and knew where we were going, so I didn’t question it. This turned out to be fairly common across the country and by the end of our travels we weren’t even batting an eyelid, we just laughed.

The car that did turn up resembled a box. A very small square box. We could only just get our two bags in the boot and then we set off, both struggling to get our rear seatbelts on. After fighting with the contraption in vain for about 10 minutes it became abundantly clear that they did not in fact work. Hold on tight, this could be quite a ride.

Arriving in Sigiriya

And so it turned out. We were headed inland, to Sigiriya, and for most of the journey we were either tailgating someone with the car horn constantly pressed and competing with the music blaring from the car’s speakers, or we were overtaking into oncoming traffic. I am not the religious sort, but I did offer a silent prayer to the big man upstairs. On our travels around the world we have had some hair raising taxi rides and this was right up there with them.

Our driver could not have looked more relaxed and as we peeled ourselves out of the car, exhausted, when we arrived at our hotel in Sigiriya, all we got was a very big smile. Very little English is spoken by the locals and a smile goes a long way.

Online paints a very different picture to reality, we know this. And yet I am still surprised to turn up somewhere and wonder if we are in the right place. The hotel looked deserted and mid construction with nobody to be seen anywhere. I even walked back to the laneway and checked the sign of the hotel. Yes, this was definitely the Lankapura Heritage hotel and the sign advertised, “Luxry rooms”. It was my first indication of what travelling in Sri Lanka would be like.

First Impressions

At home, chatting through where we would be heading, we both agreed that we had no mental image of what Sri Lanka would be like. I now saw that it was very reminiscent of travelling through much of South East Asia in 1999. At first sight, nothing much to greet the weary traveller, and then, places start growing on you. Such as when a couple of men appeared from nowhere with a cold guava drink to quench our thirsts and showed us to our room.

Cold air conditioning, a kettle for my coffee, a small fridge for beer, and an outside seating area overlooking the pool with great views across to Lion’s Rock. Things were already looking up. Now time for a stroll, find some lunch, a couple of cold beers, and check out the village of Sigiriya and continue making those first impressions.