9. Time on the beach - Time out

Continuation....

We arrived in Unawatuna in the evening.

A sweaty Frenchman named Olivier is already waiting for us. We moved into our small villa, which we booked through Airbnb for 3 days. There were 3 houses on Olivier's property. His house, our house and the staff house.

We spent the first evening in the accommodation. We made sandwiches and played cards. It was hot on the leather couch :-)

From now on, sleeping in was the order of the day!

We bought breakfast for 20 € to have a German breakfast. That's a lot of money in Sri Lanka. We went to the beach and relaxed our trip.

The water temperature was very pleasant, but the beach offered hardly any shade. So we moved to a chill beach cafe where we spent our afternoon.

Josi went swimming again and discovered a large stone moving in the water. Huh?

A huge sea turtle was lying in front of her! We joined and admired this beautiful animal. Just like that! A sea turtle!

A young Russian lady came, after we had enough of the turtle, and got too close to it. Luckily, the turtle didn't snap at her :-)

We spent the evening in the city of Unawatuna, which was only a 10-minute tuk-tuk ride away. We ate at an older man's vegetarian restaurant. He had the external appearance of a human but internally resembled a snail.

The next day we explored Unawatuna. Among them, a nice little temple by the sea, relaxed beach bars, and many small shops.

We chilled at the beach and swam in the high waves. Vacation mode on!

While Josi treated herself to a neck massage, Robert went to the hairdresser. The best haircut of my life ;-). With a 90-minute beard and facial treatment for only € 7, at a hairdresser who not only has a passion for cutting hair but also for Bob Marley. I looked like a young god! :-)

The last day for Marcel and Irina with us had arrived. We had breakfast in a small French cafe. While we were having breakfast, we witnessed a ruthless natural spectacle. Lizard vs. Scorpion! What a fight. After about 20 minutes, the lizard won and now had to expend at least twice as much energy to eat the scorpion. As you may have noticed, our highlights shift a bit :-)

We spent the day at Jungle Beach. Normally a dreamy beach. Since it was off-season, it was a bit milky and also very dirty. What a shame. We built a BEAUTIFUL !!!!!!!!!!!!! sandcastle (castle) for our niece Elsa's birthday, which unfortunately didn't impress her much on WhatsApp ;-)

On the last evening together, we wanted to go fancy. We went to Bedspace Kitchen in Unawatuna for dinner. The food was an absolute dream, and Josi ate the best burger we had ever been served up until then. We played cards afterwards in the accommodation.

Marcel is N*****!

After a pizza breakfast by the sea, with 4 turtles in the water, we said goodbye to crazy Olivier. Our guide Sam insisted on picking us up.

He drove us to Galle, a port city in southeastern Sri Lanka. We bid farewell with heavy hearts to our friends Irina and Marcel. The two of them drove back to Negombo with Sam to take the plane to Germany from there the next morning.

It was a very intense and beautiful time with you!

We will miss you...

In the evening, we explored Galle Fort with its colonial charm. The sunset can be observed particularly beautifully from the old fortress walls. Very pretty.

Therefore, we decided to explore the small fort completely the next day. We visited the Maritime Museum, which offered no highlights except for a slightly too harsh air conditioning :-) Once again, the Dutch and the Portuguese had their fingers in everything. Everything nice to look at. Good restaurants and Western standards, as well as numerous exclusive shopping opportunities, can be found in the streets of Galle Fort. Life in Galle Fort is influenced by Muslims.

The next day, we took the scooter out of the fort. Galle itself is not such a fine city. We visited a turtle hatchery in the north. It was nice to see how lovingly the turtles were taken care of. Many injured and disabled animals get a second chance here.

Later we found out that the concept of a hatchery is not always 100% perfect. At a hatchery, the turtles' eggs are collected on the beach and released in a separate location under supervision. This greatly increases the baby turtles' survival chances and the population grows, but the turtles lose their sense of orientation and can no longer reproduce naturally.

We drove back south, past Galle towards Unawatuna. The two cities of Unawatuna and Galle are only about 20 minutes apart by scooter. We visited the Peace Pagoda and a lesser-known temple nearby. In the unknown temple, a young monk was waiting for us. He was about 10 years old and proudly showed us the lively temple. The temple was more like an outdoor area, where Buddhism and Hinduism once again united. The young monk asked for a small donation, and we each received a white bracelet with the sentence: 'No Accident for you!'.

Robert still wears the bracelet. The roads are also dangerous in Indonesia :-)

We continued south, past Unawatuna, and discovered beautiful beaches. The trip to the south had only one purpose for Robert... On the way back, he could enjoy the delicious burger at Bedspace Kitchen once again ;-)

We left Galle Fort the next morning towards the beach resort of Hikkaduwa.

The next few days, I would like to summarize a bit shorter. We had booked 6 nights in a hotel right by the sea. The Main Reef was a stroke of luck. Nice staff and in the evening it was pleasantly lively despite the off-season. We bathed and enjoyed wonderful sunsets.

In Main Reef, we had breakfast right by the sea and played cards or talked to the owner and Tex in the evenings. Tex will probably be remembered by us for a long time. A very nice Australian cameraman who is currently filming cricket games in Sri Lanka professionally and has been living all over Asia for about 40 years. He gave us many tips for accommodations on our journey. Cool guy.

During the day, we visited temples or read a book. A special outing was a visit to the Tsunami Museum in Hikkaduwa. It is interestingly and pictorially documented and still dedicated to education, especially for school classes. Over 50,000 people lost their lives in Sri Lanka alone. Hikkaduwa was hit particularly hard.

One day, Robert tried his hand at being a surfer boy. Tex invited us and we went south with him and another surf instructor. Of course, Robert already has a perfect body and for him, this sport should only be child's play. ;-)

One evening, we decided to drive to the nearby lake. Nobody was there, it was already dusk. Funny enough, we rented a swan and paddled bravely across the lake. We were a little uneasy... Were there any snakes or other animals in the water? On the way back to the landing station, huge bats emerged from their hiding places and flew over the lake. It was almost dark and the atmosphere was mystical. On the same day, we also visited a Buddhist temple. It was very old, unfortunately also a bit musty because the roof was not tight and it kept raining on the wooden statues. Why don't people have an eye for such things? It upsets us a lot, as does the rather poor museum culture here.

Completely relaxed and now also curious for something new, we said goodbye to our buddy Tex and the nice boss of the Main Reef Hotel, who even gave us a little gift when we left.

We got on the train from Hikkaduwa to Colombo. A very beautiful train journey right by the sea. We drove for about 3 hours and were picked up at the train station by Sam.

We were overjoyed to see Sam again. We were supposed to stay at his great hotel for 3 nights. We enjoyed Judith's delicious food again :-)

The day after we arrived, we decided to explore the capital, Colombo. Sam did a good job again :-) We visited a beautiful Hindu temple that was different from all the other colorful temples before. We drove to the market districts of Colombo. The shopping streets were always divided by themes. For example, household, jewelry, or fashion. We ate in a slightly outdated colonial hotel where locals were not allowed to dine in the past. Later, we explored three Buddhist temples. One of them was at a dizzying height. The other was also a museum, which could have been a flea market. As we understood it, the temple was the home of the ruling Buddhist. He receives all belongings and assets from people and survivors... from small rarities to radios from the 90s and even cars. Crazy!

At first, we thought Colombo was a dirty, dilapidated city. Contrary to that, the city has a lot to offer architecturally and is clean compared to the prevailing conditions. Nice outing!

The last day in Sri Lanka started again with Judith's Happy Face breakfast :-) Scrambled eggs with a face... We swam a bit and went on a shopping tour with Sam.

We still needed protective covers for our backpacks. We went to several shops and found nothing. So Sam came up with the brilliant idea of sewing them ourselves :-)

He spontaneously called his tailor and we drove, without saying anything (typical of Sam's humor), to a shop where he bought fabric. It was already 4:00 pm.

A short stop here, a short stop there.... Sam had a little surprise for Robert.

Whenever it said 'Surprise', there was actually something ominous on the schedule :-) Sam stopped in a side street. We looked around. Only houses. Until Sam made us notice a blue car. A Subaru WRX :-) For 1 month, Robert had been looking for a Subaru in Sri Lanka to make Peter, the cheeky Subaru dealer from Hirschfeld, happy. He called out loudly 'male male' (buddy, buddy) ... A young guy came and opened the car. We took a few photos and went to a cafe for coffee.

Around 8 pm, Sam sent us a WhatsApp picture with the finished bags on the table.

Four hours from the idea to creation. Crazy! Sam gave us the bags as a gift, and we spent a fun evening together playing matchsticks, drinking arrack, and making video calls with regular guests from all over the world.

Sam brought us to the airport on time. He was visibly moved to say goodbye to both of us.

Conclusion of our first month: Sri Lanka is such a special country that we really recommend it to everyone. There is everything to see! We have seen so many animals on our travels like never before. A little preview... so far, not again. The people of Sri Lanka are incredibly friendly, the food is good (although sometimes a bit spicy), and everything is culturally rich! Dream beaches, safaris, and tea plantations in the mountains are only a 2-hour drive away.

The country is easy to travel by bus, train, or scooter/car. So far, our most beautiful travel destination. Public transportation is often frequent and regular.

Outstanding value for money ;-)

We didn't think we would say it so early, but we want to travel to Sri Lanka again.

Curious about our second destination, SINGAPORE, we boarded the well-maintained plane of SilkAir, a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines.

To find out how we liked Singapore, read the next blog entry!

Best regards, Josefine & Robert