After a lovely overnight flight to Sri Lanka from Dubai, watching Modern Family and CSI, we landed in Colombo at 6am feeling just a bit groggy. (Flight cost = £110). We'd read that a taxi should be around £13/2600sr, so we headed to the in-airport taxi post and booked one straight up! It took around 2hrs drive to get to Nawala (the original capital), the suburb of Colombo where we were staying. Absolutely knackered, we paid the extra fiver to check in early to Monsoon Suites, a hostel we booked Agoda, one of our faves for last minute deals. The rate was £16 a night (low season), expensive for us but first night in a new place calls for home comforts.
View from the window
I did take a photo of the room, but Niall managed to stroll into the shot in his boxers, which isn't quite what I was going for! Ours didn't have a window unfortunately, and there were a few power cuts while we were staying there, which is common. The WiFi wasn't the strongest, but hey ho, this is Colombo. As you can see from the photo, palm trees sprout up everywhere here, as do tuk tuks, literally stalking on every corner. This happened to work for us, as they only charge £2/400sr into town and the ride is always a bit of fun. However, they tend to be players in a few scams, as any traveller knows, which we'll talk about later.
We slept most of the first day out of exhaustion, and went out later to forage for food. There are a few local joints, but no much info on where is decent in the area, so we stuck to a local bakery a few mins down the road and a chinese restaurant called 'The Steamboat', where some locals tend to eat. Very cheap (£2 a meal) and not all that bad, just not the Sri Lankan we were looking for. The small supermarkets can give you the basics too.
Our first visit into town the next morning started off fairly positive, strolling about and being brave in a new world. We checked out the old Fort area, which seemed a bit deserted and strange set against the modern 'twin towers' built opposite. The coast area was quite nice to walk along and watch the locals flying kites, though it was seriously windy. Innocently reading our guide book, we came upon our first con artist. A man standing across the road approached us and asked if we were lost, which we defensively replied 'um, no?'. He said he was a Buddhist teacher called Silva on the way to one of the temples if we fancied walked there with him to see it. We thought no harm could come from a simple walk, but after a friendly conversation he hailed a tuk tuk and insisted we come in with him as it was quicker. We asked how much to pay, but he said not to worry and being silly and bedazzled by everything, we went along for the ride. To be fair, he did show us around the temple and tied some white string good luck bracelets on us for good measure, explaining the beliefs of Buddhism etc.
Buddha Statue at the Gangaramaya Temple, Colombo
Statues at the Gangaramaya Temple, Colombo
He then persuaded us to go to a gem shop (common thing in Colombo), which we were kind of interested in seeing and I even ended up buying a small garnet for £1.50 as a souvenir, but when we finally got dropped at the market, he demanded that we pay the tuk tuk 1600sr/£8. We were outraged and confused but what can ya do? At the end of the day, we learnt from the mistake and only lost a couple of quid. We actually felt bad for having nothing to give Silva, the cheeky tout.
Trying to act interested and going along with the con
Niall and Silva, back in the good old days
On our second day in Colombo, we ate at the local bakery I mentioned (coffee and sandwiches, couldn't help ourselves), then headed to the seaside area to hunt down some recommended sights. This turned out to be way more of a chore than we imagined, especially since half the places were closed or shut down. I spotted Seema Malaka Temple from across the lake, which looked beautiful, and attempted to find Sri Subramaniya Kovil but when asking the local children for directions, they laughed at us and said 'Superman??' so we gave up. Desperate for a beer and sweating buckets, we tried to find Clancey's Irish bar, which appeared to be long abandoned. We knew it was a Poya day, which meant the museum was closed, but apparently this makes alcohol a mission impossible too. The last thing we did was head to the train station to book our tickets to Kandy for the next day, from a tourist information man who had his own agenda in booking pricey tours (Linton from Blue Haven). The tickets for the observation car on the train were £5/1000sr, and we'd heard great things about the ride up there, so having front row seats for a little extra was a win win.
Seema Malaka Temple from afar
Colombo seafront in monsoon season
Sushi at The Steamboat, Nawala
With all the locals celebrating the Poya (full moon) day in Sri Lanka, we headed back for sushi at The Steamboat before watching the singing and dancing outside in the streets. It was fun to see everyone in their element for the Buddhist traditions. A nice end to our time in the capital of Sri Lanka. Definitely an experience, though we were glad to get out and see the prettier side of the country ASAP!
Where we stayed: Monsoon Suites ~ £16/dr/night
What we did: Gangaramaya Temple, Seema Malaka Temple, Fort district, walking the seafront, visiting a Gem shop
Daily Budget: Food ~ £4, Sights ~ Mostly Free, Transport ~ £3
Top tips: Beware of the con artists! They'll try to take you to gem shops and brush up on your tuk tuk prices. Also, sightseeing on a Poya day isn't the best idea.
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