Go East (not so) young man.... (Kandy to Trinco)

Daqgoba and Temple near Kandy, which Susan appears to be propping it up for some reason....

So after spending 4 days in Kandy, and after some debate, we headed off to Sigiriya to explore the ‘Cultural Triangle’ which is situated in the centre of Sri Lanka and comprises of many ancient cities and temples spread over 50 or 60k in the centre of Sri Lanka. We splashed out on a taxi again as we couldn’t face the bus yet.

Jet lag is a bitch, it seems that the older you get, the longer it takes to kick it. It’s been 5 nights now and I’ve not had more than 3-5 hours sleep a night, strange, you don’t feel tired during the day either, too much going on I guess, but the long nights are a real drag. Thank god for Audio books! PG Wodehouse (cheers Steve!).

The god of fish spitting or something like that.       You just don't get signs like this in the West. Or hornets I guess...

Anyway, we arrived tired yet again at the Wadula Hotel in Sigiriya which we picked due the excellent reviews on Trip Advisor, although when we got there it didn’t quite live up to expectations. I think that’s the problem with TA, it’s become so big that every Hotel or B&B has to have good reviews on there so they either pay people or get family to put up the reviews for them to make sure they look good. You can usually tell the fake reviews, they spend most of the time talking about the facilities and trips in bad English, not the state of the rooms and service. Oh well, we thought, it’s only for one night.

Susan posing  on top of Lion Rock (I know, sounds like a reggae soundsystem...) and the view down

Susan went off to check out Lion Rock while I looked after the boy. By all accounts it’s an amazing ancient Royal palace on top of a huge sheer faced rock, but not for those afflicted by Vertigo, so that was me out for a start. After that we were ready for food, but we proceeded to wait over an hour and a half for our food at Wadula, other people waited nearly 2 hours for theirs, this German party were ready to riot! Mine was dreadful when it arrived too. Rubbish.

That evening was so draining and depressing that we decided to head straight to the beach to chill out, get some sleep, acclimatise and then do the rest of the cultural stuff later when we were properly rested. So next morning we headed off to Uppuveli just North of Trinco on the North East coast. All round this area, in fact much of the North & North East coast ,was badly affected by the war and was in the control of the LTTE until a few years ago, and the also got badly hit by the Tsunami too. Because of these misfortunes and because it’s not that easy to get to, we thought it would be perfect for some chillin’.

Curtis on tour 2012...it really is starting to feel like the Curtis Joe Road Show...

It’s monsoon season on the East coast at the moment (they have to opposing monsoons that split the country in two, so you could theoretically hop from one side to another and miss the monsoon all year round. Saying that, we’ve been here for 4 days and it’s not rained once! It’s hotter and dryer that the West coast but not as humid.

We stayed our first night in a cheap fan room, which was ok, but it was very hot during the night and we were worried about Curtis de-hydrating, so we bit the bullet and checked into the plush Sea Lotus Park hotel next door. I reckon there are only about 3 or 4 rooms occupied out of 80+ so we pretty much got the place to ourselves. A/C rooms, flat screen TV, wifi, lovely pool. And, were still here 4 days later! Nice. Curtis has been swimming everyday, well, floating with us, he loves it.

The beach outside our hotel in Tincomalee. I think the boat must have been full of poor people and was torpedoed by our posh hotel....  Small temple just along the beach at Uppuveli. Almost makes me feel religious, almost....

And lastly, but most importantly. I’ve discovered 2 new local beers, Anchor, which is nicer than the Lion and Barons which is about the same. They also do a Lion Stout which is 8.8%! Needless to say I wait till the afternoon before moving on to that…..

If there’s one thing staying in the first room taught me, is that we’re way too old to be slumming it anymore, living like a local is all well and good, but when you get to my age you need life’s little luxuries. Like a hot shower, and the movie channel.   I make no excuses….. I never was much of a hippy.

Curtis in our King size bed and having his first swimming lesson. Rolf Harris would be proud...