Our final full day in Sri Lanka was a little more laid back. We were up early and made the hour trek to Galle.
Galle is a gorgeous little port town with an amalgamation of cultural influences. It was used by the Dutch, the Portuguese, and the English during its history, and has a gorgeous Dutch fort right next to the shore line. We spent the morning walking around the fort’s ramparts, wandering the quaint and narrow streets inside the fort’s walls and watching the locals swim in the waves. This is also an amazing spot to watch the fishermen catch fish by their traditional stilt fishing. The men sit on large stilt-like wooden poles and lean over with a small fishing line to grab their daily catch.
When we’d finished exploring the fort, we made our last leg of the day to Hikkaduwa. Hikkaduwa is another touristy stretch of beach that screams “paradise”. Much like Mirissa, hikkaduwa has a string of bars and restaurants right along it’s palm-fringed, white sand beaches. This is where people get stuck for weeks, meeting other tourists and partying it up until the sun rises. We arrived on a Sunday, so the vibe was a little more relaxed.
“Can you imagine staying here for a week?” Said Kelsi while we were sitting having a beer on the patio “you would meet such a great crew of people. I wish we had three weeks to stay in Sri Lanka instead of 6 days.”
“Me too” I agreed.
Unfortunately, we didn’t have that long, so we just made the most of what we could in a single afternoon. We walked up and down the endless stretch of beach, checking out the array of guesthouses and resorts along the coast. We sat down on some shaded chairs to have a relaxing nap and was harassed by a man to buy his pineapples for the next hour. Eventually we meandered our way to dinner and out for a couple of beers.
The bar we ended up at was pretty full for a Sunday night. We met a lovely British man who had been living in Sri Lanka for 9 years. He had a tonne of recommendations for nightlife places in Hikkaduwa, but by 11:00 we realized how burnt out we were from the past week.
We had a seven AM wake up time and decided to head to bed, our six day whirlwind tour of Sri Lanka finally over. We’d seen a lot of the country in such a short time. From Negombo beach to the ruins of Anuradhapura, the abandoned palace of Sigiriya to the temples of Kandy. We explored the tea plantations in the central highlands, managed to relax on pristine beaches, climb the Dutch fort ramparts in Galle and eat seafood in paradise. Not a bad trip!
The next morning we had a stop in Colombo then a flight back to India. Sri Lanka, I can’t wait to visit you again!