Eid Mubarek!

Sri Lanka!

Oct. 13th: Today was our departure date. We had a red-eye flight out of Abu Dhabi, that had us arriving at 5 a.m. Sri Lankan time. I popped into a mall close by to my apartment before my travel companions arrived to pick up a few last minute items I needed to travel. Grabbed a sub and coffee on my way out and headed home to pack. Once my friends arrived, I chugged the rest of my coffee and locked my door. We were on our way to Sri Lanka! The airport was crazy crowed - everyone was traveling for Eid. 

Which was perfect, because after we got through security and got boarding passes printed and were scavenging for food, I started to feel ill. Whatever it was hit me like a ton of bricks and I had nowhere to go but in a public trash can in front of everyone. Oh god. Mortifying. I thought after I had thrown up once, I would feel better. And gratefully, we hadn't boarded the plane yet. Unfortunately, my body had other plans for me. I threw up almost every 15 minutes from that point on until we landed in Colombo. No, I did not have a seat partner (they should thank their lucky stars), and yes I used the air sick bags. Multiple. Worst flight ever. My stomach felt like it was doing ab crunches for a marathon body building competition for hours on end. And not in a good way. Let's just say I will not be ordering anything from Subway or Dunkin Doughnuts again.

Oct. 14th: So, we arrive in Colombo around 5 a.m., get our passports stamped, get through security, exchange dirhams for rupees and search for our drivers that came with the package we booked. Still getting sick as we load our suitcases into our car. I even, embarrassingly enough, had to ask my driver to stop and pull over as we exited the airport. Ugh. Sure he was happy to have me in his car. Lol. Upon re-entering the car, I asked how long of a drive it would be until we got to our first hotel, Jungle Beach. "Miss, about 5 or 6 hours. Maybe quicker. I go quick?" Hold ON. Did he say five HOURS? Not five minutes or five miles. Holy hell. I guess no one had bothered to check in to seeing where Colombo was in comparison to Trincomalee. As it turns out, Colombo is in the southwest region of the island and Trincomalee is in the northeast. Polar opposites of one another. Pretty big oversight on our part. If I hadn't been sick, I would have really enjoyed the drive. And I did still, despite my stomach bug. Our driver was very accommodating and friendly and pointed out many sights along the way, including Kanthale Lake (the biggest lake in Sri Lanka) made by King Agbo. 

Halfway to our hotel, we stopped at a sleepy beach-side restaurant with views of a bigger-than-life Buddha statue across the water from its deck seating. With trepidation, I ordered some Ginger Ale and fruit. I was so hungry and thirsty, but didn't want to embarrass my company further by another airport episode. Thankfully, the food and drink stayed down fine and I was on my way to full recovery! Once we arrived at Jungle Beach, our jaws dropped. This place was straight out of heaven. A true jungle oasis. We were welcomed by warm staff and given a white flower to place into a bowl of water to signal the resort had new guests. We were ushered to our rooms that included an outdoor shower and bamboo ceilings and got changed for the beach immediately. We had dinner at the hotel, rented a movie from the front desk and nursed our bug bites.

Oct. 15: This morning we woke up early to get our tour started early. We hopped into our cars and headed to Kanniya Hot Springs where a man holding a snake and had a monkey tied to a pole got us to take pictures with him, then demanded rupees. Lesson learned. There were five or six wells of water in the springs, increasing in heat. We all dipped out feet in them -- I was crossing my fingers for some healing on my mosquito bites -- then moved on to see the ancient and crumbling Welgambehera Buddhist Temple (where we learned never to turn our backs to a Buddha statue), drove across the longest bridge in Sri Lanka: Kinniya Bridge and stopped for a fresh king coconut at a roadside shop on our way toward Marble Beach (a Navy-owned beach and best beach on the island, according to our drivers). We had lunch there and swam, then drove to The Dutch Fort to visit the Thurukoneshwaram Hindu Kovil (a Hindu temple on the highest point in Trincomalee). 

This was the highlight of the trip for me. I was intrigued by the Hindu/Buddhist influences of this island and think it might be something I look into further. The religion just seems so blissful and peaceful. It got a hold of me during my time there and since my return to Abu Dhabi. We bought some souvenirs, stopped at a pharmacy on the way back to the hotel (for guess what? bug spray), got dinner and drinks delivered to our rooms, had a henna specialist come in and give us all henna and called it a night.

Oct. 16: Today was ELEPHANTS! We all wanted to make sure we got to ride an elephant while on the island, so our drivers made it happen. We drove to Habarana City where we had a ride on Aliyah the elephant through a jungle/marsh area, and took a village tour. The tour involved a cow/cart ride, a boat ride on Hiriwadunna Lake where we saw tons of lotus flowers (Lotus Flower Bomb, anyone?), and homemade lily pad leaf hats crafted by our boat paddlers.

Once we docked, we visited a local home situated in the middle of a big vegetable farm. The home was a tree house, with tarps around the windows. The kitchen a shack with a fire. The woman of the house cooked for us and we tasted homegrown bananas, herbal tea served out of a coconut cup and jugary - Sri Lankan rice with cucumber and macioc curry. We had lunch, stopped at a gem store and a sari store, where we were all treated to the best service and some of us bought silk saris or pants. Joy had braids in for the trip and had her hair up in a large bun and got stares EVERYWHERE we went. Our driver told us the locals were commenting on if the hair was real or not. They couldn't believe it. The girls at the sari shop were amazed by it and shocked when Joy took it out of her bun for them to see. Lol.

We drove to our second and final hotel of the stay after this, Ulagalla Resort. Clouds started rolling in, which wasn't unusual, it had rained a little bit each evening we had been there, but by the time we got close to our resort, it was full on storming! I was loving it - didn't get much rain in Phoenix and haven't seen rain in Abu Dhabi yet. It was the most beautiful welcome, in spite of the rain, and perhaps because of it. The manager of the hotel came out and served us cinnamon tea in coconuts and had us light a candle and ring bells signaling our arrival to the rest of the staff. It was late and we were exhausted, so we ordered room service and watched The Impossible. If you know this movie, it may not have been the smartest choice, as it is a movie based on the tsunami that ripped through Thailand and Sri Lanka in 2004. The area where were were staying was the worst hit on the island. Our drivers told us it used to be full of hotels, resorts, beaches and restaurants, but all was lost when the tsunami hit. Jungle Beach Resort was only a year old. Every five minutes I kept glancing at the thin walls of our bungalow, fingers crossed that the movie wouldn't come to life!

Oct. 17th: We spent this day by the pool, getting spa treatments and riding bikes around the 58 acre property. There was another rain storm this evening, but we had an amazing five-course dinner upstairs in the resort's open-air restaurant with bats circling around us while we ate :)

Oct. 18th: Today we leave. Five am wake-up call to start to long journey back to Colombo. I was awake almost the entire drive soaking up last-minute scenery (hard to believe, I know). We stopped to see Buddhist temples from afar and in a coastal fishing village (The Impossible flashbacks) to see a "magical" church and rows upon rows of deformed beggars. I bought two books on Buddhism and our flight to Kichen, India was flawless. I slept the whole way.

Once we got to India though, man. I felt like a prisoner. Airport security escorted us and two other women traveling from Sri Lanka on to Abu Dhabi into a glass room where they inspected only our hand luggage, took our passports to print our boarding passes and where each of us had to go into a smaller curtained box to be patted down and inspected, all while lots of men stood around the glass walls and watched. Then, I was told I needed to come with security to identify everyone's luggage because the woman in Sri Lanka put them all in my mind. The men were super scary and serious and told me I needed to know the contents of every suitcase, say that they were all mine and I couldn't bring my purse or passport of phone with me to do so. I walked away from my group thinking, "Well. This should be interesting. I hope my heart doesn't pound out of my chest." We walked a ways, then went down a wobbly elevator to the basement level where luggage was being loaded and into a small, dirty room. They pointed at a chair and told me to sit. To be honest, I was petrified, but was trying to keep it together. Was this procedure because we were American? Female? Do they do this to everyone? I identified our luggage successfully and was brought back through basement security again to meet up with my friends. Never been so glad to see their faces! Flight home was seamless, had a loooooooong line to get stamped back into the UAE, almost even longer line for a taxi (no one knows what you're talking about if you say cab), and by the time I got home, I fell into bed immediately.

A great first trip -- memorable in every sense of the word. Learned many traveling lessons this time around and next time will be more prepared. Cheers to many more trips like this one!