After a very stressful,start to my travel day, Rebecca, Chris & I made our way up to Perth Airport. It was a an uneventful drive and we arrived in plenty of time for my flight! I was not flying until 00.25 but needed to be there early enough that the guys were not driving back in the dead of night! Also, me being me, I like to be at the airport in plenty of time. To be fair being over 5 hours early is a tab over the top! 😂
It was incredibly sad saying goodbye to my beautiful Rebecca, and to Chris especially as we don’t know when we’ll see each other again, probably not until sometime in 2026! Which is forever away.
They have looked after me very well, and for me to stay with them for 3 months has been amazing. It’s not easy sharing your home for a long time and so I am extremely grateful. 🙏
I will miss them & Curly the cat very much.
Once they left and I stopped crying I made my way to the only bar in the airport and had a large JD & Coke and a portion of chips, very comforting. 😊
I was able to check in with 3 hours to go. My case was exactly 20kg, which is still heavier than I wanted. This is after sending a large 6kg parcel back to England (not cheap especially after DHL then charged me another £65 on top of the £60 I’d already paid! ) and sending clothes to the op shop! The lovely Tracey is going to take a few more bits back with her after Sri Lanka.
I had booked a lounge, it’s not very expensive and offers somewhere quieter to sit, it’s also right next to my gate, Handy!
I kept check the flight status and it started saying “Relax” (never seen this before) so I Relaxed and ordered another drink, checked again in just over 10 mins and suddenly it’s changed to “Final Call” WTF! 😳
I grabbed my stuff and legged it downstairs to find a completely empty gate, and the staff asking if I was Miss Claire! Oh dear. The only people behind me were those needing assistance! 😂 luckily for me there was still a short queue to actually board, so I didn’t look to conspicuous.
It was a 5.5 hour flight to Kuala Lumpur with Air Asia, so no screens for films! I read for most of the flight and tried to rest my eyes, but couldn’t sleep. We arrived in KL in the morning and had a short 2 hour wait then another no screens for films 3.5 hour flight to Colombo, again no sleep. I arrived in Colombo again first thing in the morning, and sailed through customs, no visa issues, thank god. I also managed to get a SIM card sorted in the airport, grabbed my case and then met the lovely Buddhi when I came through customs. Buddhi is the guy who organised my tour last time I was in Sri Lanka in 2018, I stayed with him and his wife, Sriyani, then and again this time.
They have a little B & B in Negombo.
I was absolutely knackered, having missed a whole nights sleep but managed to go for a walk and have some dinner, delicious homemade Sri Lankan Curry before crashing in bed at 7.30pm. 😴😴
I had a great nights sleep and spend the following day having a massage, interesting, 🤔 not a bad massage but the oil they used smelt weird, vinegary and not that pleasant tbh. The spa organise a Tuk Tuk to pick up and drop off, so as soon as I’d been dropped off I tried to shower away the oil, but it’s oil, so it took a while to get rid of the smell.
Then I spent the rest of the afternoon by the beach, sitting in a fancy hotel, it’s great you get to use their facilities but not have the expense of staying there!
Another early night then time to leave and head to Hikkaduwa.
Buddhi was driving me down to Hikkaduwa and asked if it was ok to take another guy, who was heading to Galle, I said that was fine. Puta was a great guy. He was currently hanging around in Negombo waiting to head out to his job as Chief Engineer in a massive Oil container ship! He had some pretty scary stories, one in particular about being in a huge oil tanker, which was empty, just holding ballast somewhere in the Ocean near South Africa and their rudder sheared off!! (Apparently very rare) This meant they had no control of the ship in extremely high seas, everyone was sick as dogs for over a week until they could be towed to safety!😳😱 He showed me pictures of the engines in these massive containers, they are beyond huge! Very interesting chap.
Buddhi was also telling me about changes here in Sri Lanka with Palm Oil.
When I was here last, in 2018, there were Palm Oil plantations everywhere. The government are now encouraging farmers to not grow them, and helping them financially to switch to other crops, mainly rubber trees. You can actually see the impact, with far fewer palm oil trees. The reason behind this change is that harvesting Palm Oil is very toxic, to both the people harvesting it and to the wildlife and surrounding flora and fauna. The toxicity comes from the pulp left after the oil is extracted. Together with the issues of deforestation due to Palm Oil Plantations, it’s really positive to see these changes.
It was a very interesting and informative drive! Everyday’s a school day! 😂
Hikkaduwa. I was last here 6 years ago and during the low season, it was very quiet and relatively peaceful. I was looking forward to seeing it in high seas on and a little bit more lively. Mmmm, be careful what you wish for!
My hotel is pretty nice, I’d booked a ‘budget’ room, no idea why I did that! 😳 The room itself is OK, tiny with no window, but doable, just, the issue I have is that it’s a “dead zone” so I can’t get wifi on either my phone or tablet, even though I have data on my phone. This is a tad frustrating. WiFi has been an ongoing issue for the last few months. (Anita! You know!)
When I’m on my own, I need to plan things, book things, access news, social media etc etc. not being able to do this is frustrating and irritating. The lovely people at the hotel tried putting a router outside the room, this made no difference. Eventually they have agreed to move me to another room, which is much better and has some WiFi signal.
So, Hikkaduwa, well it is very different to when I was here before. First of all it’s very busy, which is a positive, especially for the Sri Lankan people who have had a rough few years. 90% of the tourists are Russian. This means that pretty much everything is geared towards the Russian tourists. I tried at least 4 different places to book a group Mangrove Tour, all the tours they offer were in Russian with a Russian speaking guide. A group tour costs £10 I have now had to book a solo tour for £30! ☹️
There is a beautiful beach here called Turtle Beach. It’s shallow with reefs and good snorkelling. It gets pretty busy. I was having a little wander along the beach and was thrilled to see 2 beautiful giants Turtles 😍. They were both right near the shore line just mooching about. It was a wonderful site. The less wonderful site was all the stupid people touching them, trying to move the and generally not respecting their space. It was heartbreaking. When people touch them with lotions or creams on their hands this can cause the turtles problems.
There was a Sri Lankan guy shouting from the beach to leave them alone, but one particular woman just totally ignored him, she was too busy stroking the poor turtles head whilst posing for a fucking photograph! Absolutely disgraceful behaviour and also very upsetting to see.
It’s a difficult dilemma for then Sri Lankans, because the Turtles come to the beach if their own free will, so how do you police it?
Personally I’d have armed guards and if you touch them you die!! 💀😆
On a lighter and much happier note I met up with some fabulous Newquay friends. Lovely Alex & Leah. I’ve know Alex since opening Coffee on the Corner, a lot of you will remember his amazing and delicious Biscoff Brownies!!
We realised we were in Sri Lanka at the same time and organised a meet up in Galle, where they were staying. I got a Tuk Tuk from Hikkaduwa and we met at a beautiful restaurant in Galle called Church Street Social.
It’s very surreal seeing people in a totally different place, but also felt really comfortable. We enjoyed a few beers some yummy food and lots of fun. A fantastic evening. Thank you so much guys. 😘❤️
I then made my way back with the Tuk Tuk driver, who had waited for me. I feel he might have waited in the nearest pub, because the drive back was a little scary, he was watching a program on his phone, trying to chat to me, slowing down for no reason and at times it looked like he was falling asleep!! 🫣 Hey Ho, we made it back!
I have decided to cut short my stay in Hikkaduwa and spend a couple of days down in Galle Fort, which is a great place. So I’ll be here until Thursday.
I have met some really wonderful Sri Lankan people here, who are very kind and helpful and I’m determined to enjoy my experience even if it’s a little different to what I was expecting.
I’m loving the food, back to my favourite Veggie Rice! The Sri Lankan curry’s are yummy and I tried a local favourite, Kottu! OMG, so good.
I’m also super excited about potentially meeting up with another friend this week and then Tracey arrives in 9 days!! 😍❤️😍
That’s all for now.
Love and miss you all.
💙🩵💚🧡
I’m going to limit the number of pics, as I don’t think the WiFi can cope with lots!
Books Read.
The Seven. Robyn Delvey. Interesting, a pretty good read.
Bricking it. Nick Spalding. Fun, light hearted and an easy read.
There’s something about Mira. Sonali Dev. An enjoyable read, something a little different.
Hereandthereclaire.com 