Beach Bummin' on the West Coast

Still a couple weeks behind on the blog, work has been really busy, but bear with me. We went down to Galle 2 weekends ago for some fun in the sun. Galle is one of the larger cities in Sri Lanka, and the largest southern coastal city. It is known primarily for the Dutch Fort as the main landmark, along with the nearby beach towns and watersports that go along. Rajitha, Renuka and I decided to be adventureous and take the train down to Galle from Colombo on Saturday morning, find a guesthouse to stay for a night, and head back on Sunday afternoon.
Our orignial plan was to take the 9:00am train from Colombo-Fort station to Galle. However, the night before Renuka and I met Anand and Anjali from New Delhi, fellow guests at Global Towers, who told us when they planned to take the 9:00 Saturday train from Fort it actually departed early(!), at 8:30. So we texted Rajitha and told her to meet us early at Fort on Saturday morning. As it turned out, the train left on schedule, but being the beginning of school holidays and government employees receiving 2nd class train vouchers, we ended up on a packed train for the 3 hour ride down to Galle. Bad news as we had to stand, by the bathroom no less, the entire way. But really, outside the fact we had to stand, the train ride wasn't too bad. It basically stopped in each town along the way, but it ran on time and we got to Galle before noon as expected. We also lucked out by ending up next to a guy who worked in the Galle tourist information center, so during the ride we chatted it up with him and when we got to Galle he helped us with a map and suggested things to see in Galle, and set us up with a tuk-tuk.

Once in Galle we first had lunch - string hoppers kindly prepared by Rajitha's family for our trip. We then headed off to visit the Dutch Fort, which was basically a regular old fort similar to the San Juan fort but not quite as impressive. Within the fort walls there's an Aman hotel, the Galle Fort Hotel. Aman hotels are among the most expensive in the world with prices here ranging from $450-$800 per night. We got a tour of the spa amenities, and though it was very nice, I don't see how anyone could justify spending that much to stay at that place. Anyhow, after the fort we headed down toward Unawatuna, a beach town that many people and books recommended as the best in the area. Along the way we stopped at the Carlsberger hotel for afternoon tea, which was quite pleaseant as it offered a nice secluded view of the harbor below. A lot of these fancy hotels in Sri Lanka are built in old colonial estates and mansions, which make for a nice level of ambience.
After tea we continued on towards Unawatuna. The southern coast of Sri Lanka is relatively unscathed, typically lined with the standard grocery stores and guesthouses. The road is close enough to the ocean to catch the salty sea whiff, and the roads - at least while we were there - are not congested. The sights that did jump out at me were the spots that mark remains of the tsunami's destruction. You'll see a row of houses/shacks interrupted with an open lot which only contains a floor still in the ground, but the house's walls and everything else was swept away. Basically you see a tile kitchen floor out in the open - somewhat unnerving. Its interesting, the locals talk quite openly about the tsunami and how certain buildings and landmarks were swallowed, just like that.
Along the way we stopped at a sea turtle hatchery, and later on to take pics of stilt fishermen. The hatchery was really cool, basically a group of people have started this conservatory to protect sea turtles. They seek out turtle egg poachers that are illegally taking sea turtle eggs, and buy the eggs off of them. At the hatchery, they bury the eggs and 65 days later a baby turtle emerges from the sand. They raise the turtles in little tanks for a few weeks before they take them out to release them into the sea. A couple facts about sea turtles include (1) the gender of a sea turtle depends on the tide and temperature of the water, and (2) sea turtles always come back to their place of birth to lay eggs. The hatchery also had a few older sea turtles including a guy over 60 years old! It was a neat experience to see these little creatures up close and personal.
The fishermen on stilts was a scam, they wanted us to pay them to get up on the stilts so we could take pics. Instead we kept on driving and found some fishermen actually fishing, so we got a couple pics. Nothing special.
When we got to Unawatuna we first stopped by Shanti Guest House as recommended by the tourism guy, and at 2200Rs a night for a triple it was good enough for us. We parked and recharged for a little while before heading to dinner. We went next door to a nicer guesthouse for dinner, which turned out to be a seafood feast. I was surprisingly impressed by my devilled prawns, and of course a Lion Lager to wash them down. Unfortunately I also got eaten alive by the mosquitos, but all in all it was a very satistfying dinner. After chowing down we didn't do much, just chat a bit before hitting the sack for the night.
I woke up fairly early on Sunday, and spent the morning down at the beach. We had some morning coffee at the guesthouse, though quickly left after we were taken over by an army of crows. We then headed over a bit to have some breakfast at a beach hut, after which Rajitha left Galle because she had plans in the afternoon with her family. Behind our guesthouse was a 'lagoon' type area where the water is calm and warm, basically there's a reef about 30 yards out where the waves break so the rough waters dont make it to shore. The water was very clear and clean, though I stepped on a shell which lodged a bit into my toe and hurt bad. We basically just chilled out all morning at the beach. Renuka and I just hung out at the beach for the rest of the morning. As we were leaving, I had a brilliant idea to climb on some beach boulders to get a nice view. The climbing part was fine, both Ren and I make it up, but my dumb ass tried to jump down and I ended up scraping up my shin pretty good, resulting in me racing over to the guesthouse for some antiseptic and band-aids. Disaster.
After my fall we decided it was time to leave, so we took a tuk-tuk back to Galle and planned to visit the tourist information center for info about getting on a train, but unfortunately they were out to lunch. Instead we walked over to the bus depot and managed to talk to some guy there who assured us we could get on the next bus to Colombo. The buses in Sri Lanka actually aren't too bad, thankfully they limit the number of passengers (most people had a seat) and types of passengers (humans only). So for 3 hours we were crusining along the coast of Sri Lanka, 'stopping' at every town along the way for people to jump off and on. At the end of the ride we were fortunate to get dropped off right back at Wellawatta rather than having to go up to Colombo Fort, capping off an adventerous and interesting Sri Lanka travel experince.