Sri Lanka's coast is idyllic and a perfect holiday spot.
As our aircraft skimmed over Colombo, I tried hard to spot a colour other than green below. It’s ironic then that Sri Lanka is battling its worst tourism crisis in over three decades of internal conflict, with travel warnings rife.
The industry is clearly going all out to bring back the numbers that once flocked to this tropical island. The island awaits, with an easy visa stamp on arrival, at no charge for 30 days. Security was at its highest, in tandem with the SAARC summit, with our very own Prime Minister in town.
We were a group of five- to 55-year-olds, and so we carefully worked around and beyond the typical traveller’s itinerary, which usually goes Colombo-Kandy-Nuwara Eliya. The latter two, most sought-after hill destinations, were in central Sri Lanka (though slightly overrated, I found, in retrospect).
The first few days in the country flew by quite quickly and busily — a flurry of sightseeing in the three cities — from an elephant orphanage en route to Kandy, to cultural dances and Hindu temples in Nuwara Eliya, the Sita Eliya. What kept us hooked for a good part of one of the mornings in Kandy was undoubtedly the Dalada Maligawa, a temple where the Sacred Tooth Relic of the Buddha was enshrined.
A glorious mix of rustic pillars carved in wood to intricately painted ceilings; traditional pagodas (or dagobas, as the bell-shaped structures are known locally) and wooden structures surrounding the shrine that lies quietly within. But as we moved on from the hilly areas, we all knew we were more than ready for the coast.
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On a friend’s recommendation, we had chosen to drive down to Yala, a national park that falls along the eastern-southern coast, a good distance from Colombo. Not that India has a deficit of sanctuaries, but the idea of a safari by the beach worked well to our imagination. It helped that Yala is thought to have one of the highest densities of leopard in the world — and if our three leopard spottings in a span of three hours is anything to go by, it may as well be one.
The safari at first is like any other, you could be in Sariska for all you know, but as one inches deeper into the forest, the foliage is much drier, thinner and wears a shade of a greatly faded green. A high density of crocodiles, storks and other birds, hares, buffalos, elephants and deer, we noticed. And then, quietly and stealthily, we saw the leopard — walking about 10 feet away amidst the thin branches.
Almost a shadow, if you will, with not much hope of a good picture. Another time, we spotted him sitting under a canopy watching us (did I see him smirk?) and then made his way to the unknown as silently as he appeared — the opposite of the frenzy he had caused on the safari route with over twenty jeeps lining, revving and roaring to catch a glimpse.
Quite content with the sightings on the lazy, sunny Sunday afternoon, our jeep made way out of the forest area, and as we watched, the coast opened up to us; a sparkling white beach with a grand stone hillock for a background. Yala proved to be quite a picturesque place, and for such a dry piece of land, it was surprisingly dotted with lakes and ponds, stretching out to the sea.
A dreamy breakfast table atop our hotel, with the pool below, the lake beyond and the sea a little further. Turn your head, and on the other side lay the forest, dotted with cottages, and, far beyond, the outlines of the hills.
From Yala on, we were to drive to Bentota about seven hours away, another breezy beach town which had come highly recommended. Bentota is barely two hours away from Colombo, and is, in fact, a popular weekend spot for the locals.
And as they say, it’s not the destination that is as important as the journey to it — this held more than true in our case. Driving along the coast, we bypassed some of quaintest towns in the country — Matara, Weligama, Galle and Hikkaduwa. The ruins of the 17th-century Portuguese Galle Fort, a World Heritage Site, is something else, the walls all made of coral.
The salty breeze is thick with the ghost of a European past; with the bastions, churches, mosques and houses. We drove past salubrious sights like benches neatly lined up, on which couples sat cosily under umbrellas, and lanes with the typical coastal Hansel-and-Gretel-like houses with sloping roofs, on that seven-hour-long journey.
We reached Bentota spent yet refreshed, just in time for a lazy dip in the warm ocean. Under the gentle gaze of the setting sun, I thought of the stories our guide Ranjan had kept us engaged with through the week — of the great Sinhalese kings, the intriguing Buddhist culture and even the tradition of the greatly orange King Coconut. And all that was captured that evening by the bronze Sri Lankan tan that we were all stamped with.