Serendipity Travel - Adventure Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is like no place on earth, none that we've visited anyway and there have been a few. Sri Lanka is steeped in magical folklore and spiritual fascination. Its people are kind and dignified and there is a sense of true empathy in everyone we encountered.

We found authenticity in the streets and the tiny villages we visited. We found pure and earnest acceptance in homesteads in hillsides and tea plantations. We found people who have not forgotten about true love and compassion for their fellow human beings.

After a manic two-day stopover in Colombo, we needed to get to the beach, our travel agent contact in Colombo is Shiyam Mohamed. Shiyam is originally from Sri Lanka and was raised and educated in England. He possesses a wealth of knowledge on tourism matched by his passion for travel. Shiyam booked us into a quaint resort in the town of Kalutara, just 40 km south of Colombo. For just R8 per person we caught a local bus and we were happy to see Colombo in our review mirror. Our first Sri Lankan bus ride was thrilling, colourful and exciting. Busses rule the road in Sri Lanka and everybody gives way to the rather large colourful busses, some with very loud musical hooters that are used almost too often.

It was a short ride to Kalutara, one of the west coast's larger cities on the coast. The long stretch of golden beach north of town remains reasonably unspoilt, dotted with a string of upmarket hotels languishing in the shade coconut palms. The town straddles the broad estuary of the Kalu Ganga, or 'Black River', where the town gets its name. Kalutara was once an important spice-trading centre, controlled at different times by the Portuguese, Dutch and British. Nowadays it's more famous as the source of the island's finest mangosteens, the health giving tropical fruits. Shiyam recommended Tangerine Beach Hotel, we accepted mainly because it was a great rate but also because we just wanted to get to the beach at any price.

If you are a resort lover this will be perfect for you, positioned right on a pristine palm fringed beach. Tangerine is clean, cool and friendly and that is all you need from a resort. However we are not very good resort travellers and two days was enough to rent a car and head out.

Kalutara is a perfect base to travel further and do what most tourists do; visit the temples, visit the Spice Gardens, get an Ayuvedic massage treatment and take a tour to the famed Cultural Triangle or just chill on a lounger in the shade of a whispering palm tree and think of which exotic cocktail to order next.

In Kalutara we met some interesting people. Janaka Perera, together with his wife run a cool little restaurant called Little Door. They will whip up a scrumptious meal for you in no time and for a hundred bucks you will eat like a King.

At Oasis restaurant situated right next to the railway tracks we met an interesting character named Tikka, who speaks perfect Russian. Tikka was a mine of useful information and he was eager to help us find and organise anything we wanted, at a hefty tourist price and with almost no haggling.

Raja was our tuk-tuk driver, stationed most days outside the Tangerine Hotel. He was very helpful, although slightly dodgy. He almost scammed us out of three grand, but in true Buddhist style he just could not pull it off, but that we can discuss in our future tales.

One of the places you must visit when in Kulatara is the Kalutara temple, one of the countries most holy places of worship. Inside the Dogoba is a magnificent array of paintings describing the stories of Buddha. The 3 story high Kalutara Vihara, is a Buddhist temple built in the 1960s which holds the distinction of being the only shrine in the world that is hollow. It is one of the few temples of this calibre open to tourists.

There is just so much to tell you about Sri Lanka, we promised ourselves that we will not rush it. So we will leave this week's adventure on day 4 of our Sri Lankan Magical Tour. Next week we will tell you about our Rent a Car experience and how we found our beachside cottage in the picturesque party village of Hikkaduwa.