Sri Lanka in a Flash

Located off the southern coast of India lies the beautiful, lush tear-shaped island of Sri Lanka. Since an extended visit to India didn't seem plausible for this round of travel, the small island would serve as a substitute for me. Always determined to find a travel companion, I spoke to the only other backpacker on my flight and turned out he was Israeli - easy! We made our way to Negombo and found a place to stay on Lewis Place - maybe it was called Seashore Inn, but not cheap at 1700 Rupees ($15) a night. We grabbed some dinner and plotted out our next moves - they weren't the same. Having just trekked in Nepal for a month with a month to tour Sri Lanka, he was on a slow path to the beaches, whereas I had five days to rush through the most notable sights.

Girl on the bus.

I got a train to Kandy, and again came up to the only other backpacker - Fabian, a 30-year-old doctor from Hamburg who spoke excellent English. We teamed up to get a deal on two rooms, one with a hot shower that we would both use - separately! We stuck together for essentially the remainder of my trip. In Kandy, we caught a birthday party and then went to the Temple of the Tooth Relic and the Botanic Gardens.

Walked past this birthday party of a Sri Lankan girl.

Temple of the Tooth Relic

Botanic Gardens resembling Palm Dr. in Beverly Hills

Bats!

My German friend, Fabian

We ended the day with hours of exhausting but cheap public transport to get to Dalhousie's White House guesthouse to climb Adam's Peak. We had an assortment of Sri Lankan curries for dinner and got some sleep before our 2:30am alarms.

Traditional Sri Lankan meal

We got up and conquered the 5,200 steps up to the peak. At 2,250 meters, Adam's Peak is one of Sri Lanka's most sacred mountains due to the belief that Buddha himself left his sacred footprint near the summit. We were a little unfortunate to have the sunrise itself covered by clouds, but as the sun rose above them, we got some nice views, just not the pictures to prove it. We got back for breakfast at 8:30am and were on the buses to Dambulla by noon. We move fast.

Unfortunately, we had to go back up through Kandy to get there, but we were at the guesthouse by 7 pm. We got going early in the morning and took a bus to Sigiriya, an ancient fortress with famous paintings built into a large rock surrounded by gardens. It was very impressive, but another chunk of stairs to climb and $30 out of my pocket. Before moving towns, we went back to Dambulla to see the cave temples filled with Buddha statues. Onto Polonnaruwa for the night.

Sigiriya - Ancient fortress

We took bikes from Samudra Inn (decent, not cheap or that clean, ant-infested) and rode around the ancient ruins of Polonnaruwa for another $25 entrance fee. It was very beautiful, but after so many days of traveling and physical exertion, Fabian and I were hot, sore and exhausted. We didn't last long before lunch. After that, Fabian continued north and I stayed another night before heading back down to Colombo Airport. As I was waiting for the bus to arrive, I caught a WiFi signal and Skyped my pregnant sister. She gave me the shocking news that she had two babies on the way instead of one! My reaction caused some commotion from the dozens of locals around me, but I hardly noticed them. When the bus finally came, it was a 9 hour journey to get to the airport, and that's arriving an hour early. Bali, I am coming!

Polonnaruwa