2 weeks in Sri Lanka

When you arrive at Columbo airport go to the tourist board there, they will help you a lot.
They will advise you and recommend an agent just a few feet from their stand.
I stayed the first night in a 5 star hotel in Colombo but didn't realise this was quite a ride from the airport.
On leaving I stayed at a beautiful place, close to the airport called the Eco Tourist Village, wish I had done that first time I think I would have spent the whole time there.
Wasn't very impressed with Kandy, all my life I had wanted to go there but there really isn't anything there and the drive from Colombo to there took 5 hours! Traffic is very slow in Sri Lanka, about 25 mph with a good wind behind and nothing but grimy Indian villages all the way, no scenery.
The agents at the airport can get you discounts on the hotels etc and usually provide transport.
I stayed in Colombo for one night and then they came the next morning to discuss any places I wanted to go to from then on.
Good luck.

Hello Merrills,
From Colombo (airport) to Kandy takes 2 1/2 top 3 hours, even in heavy traffic. I went twice last week.
The road is probabaly the best in Sri Lanka, it was biult during a former presidents time and was the pride of Sri lanka (carpet road) also presently being re-surfaced. On the way you pass two villages that specialize in basket weaving and then pottery, there is the cashew sales girls in one village (lined under straw huts along the road) and you also go past the turning for Pinawella elephant orphanage. As you get closer to Kandy you climb into hill country and its very beautiful.
The train runs regularly from Colombo to kandy and there's a regualr service from the airport to the rail station (24 hrs) .- my clip of the Colombo Kandy train on my web site (sorry ,haven't sussed out how to post it here yet,). I met someone who thought the train trip amazing , then he went on the Kandy Nanu Oya train and was even more impressed. There is a Colombo Trinco train but make sure the west coast is open( safe) first.
There are also regular bus services although sometimes busy, both CTB (slow tank like) or private (fast as hell and small). Many people think that after a long flight its a good idea to stay one night either in Nearby Negombo or , a close small hotel, either way it shouldn't cost much and a good way to get over the jet lag.
I would avoid tour organizers but its really up to you, we are all different. Sri lanka is pretty easy and with a litle plannning , or no plannng at all, you can get around and see whatever interests you. Just be honest and you will be fine. I really like kandy and after many trips here moved, hopfully for good in 1999.
You should see it at your own pace and at different times.
best wishes
Chris

If Beebop lives in Kandy suggest you get him to help you when you arrive.
It did take me 5 hours from central Colombo to Kandy because I had a driver who was tired and wanted to stop for a meal, which I had to pay for, and then a couple of hours later he stopped at a roadside cafe for coffee and more snacks. Try explaining to a driver whose English is not good that you want to go direct.
I went to Sri-Lanka from Kerala so I wasn't jet-lagged but i was delayed at the airport for 4 hours.
Go to the tourist board at the airport if if Beebop leaves it here on the page.
If you have some savvy you will know if you are being duped and I'm sure you are used to haggling anyway?
Train travel may be more scenic than the road, as for passing two villages I'm sure beebop is right but it is two villages in a line of villages to Kandy. The maximum speed limit is 25 mph, if you can get up to that.
I agree on the way back the new driver got to the Ranweli Holiday Village Hotel, Negombo, Sri Lanka, nr the airport in a lot less than 5 hours.
Check out the Eco Village resort by going to their website or

Hi,
I've travelled that road many times and never taken more than about three hours. As Beebop said, usually more like 2 1/2 hours.
Of course there are villages along the road side, Roads do tend to be built to connect places where people live or work. Like towns and villages.
The type of road that just goes from city to city, with no villages/towns along the way, is what we call , here in the western world, a motorway or highway or autostrada, etc. They don't exist in Sri Lanka.

I love driving through the villages along the way. Thats all part of the Lanka that I go to see and experience.
The route is not all villages,,, there's plenty of beautiful scenery along the way.
Having said all that, I prefer the train. The first part of the journey from Colombo is just flat countryside but as the train climbs up into the hill country the scenery is great. Best on the left side of the train. From Kandy to Nanu Oya ( the station that serves Newara Eliya) , the scenery gets better still and then from Nanu Oya to Ella it's even better.
To take in Kandy and Unawatuna,,, train from Colombo to Kandy.
See what you want to around that area, plenty of sites. Then train south through the hill country , as far as Haputale, then a bus to Matara and bus onwards to Unawatuna.
Oh Yea,, unlike Benny, I like Kandy and allways enjoy my time spent there. Some places take a little getting to know, I think Kandy is one of them.
Rod.

hello,
I would be glad to help anyway i can. Regarding the tourist board. the tourist information in kandy (near the mali Gawa temple) is excellent, or rather the desk near the door is. I pointed it out to Miki (from Japan) and she said the girl there knows all the bus numbers you will need and has everything memorized. Rod is an even better wealth of info and i'm sure will help if you ask him nicely.
best wishes
Chris

I was just thinking. speed limit of 25mph? is that just for the push bikes.

I don't know about you guys , my journey was from the Presidents Palace to Kandy and I can't see how my driver could have got lost, altho' I did have it out with his boss and he said too that 5 hours was impossible to the Swiss Hotel on the hillside. Very big hotel, but I was the only guest staying there and the weather was overcast for the four days but there you go, as I said maybe you old timers can't help this poor guy when he arrives.
I mean 9 years living in Kandy?
Myself I have been working in India for the last 25 years and this was the first time in Sri Lanka and the last.
Sri Lanka Airways was the most inefficient airline I have ever travelled on and I was only going from Trivandrum to Colombo.
Pity the ferry has stopped, I think I could have swum there quicker.
4 hour delay in the airport for a 45 min trip!
I walked all around Kandy and I'm afraid you guys are going to have to convince me why I did it?
Tuttut drivers who try to rip you off just because you are a Westerner?

Merrills,
Doesn't look as tho' you are reading these post as you have not replied to any?
Anyway I have found the website for the Ranwelli Eco Village for you to have a look at:- http://www.ecovillagelanka.com
Good luck with all this conflicting advice.
Benny.

Ok here we go,
First of all, ‘tuk tuk’ is a rather a dull derivative. I prefer something I read from a little girls poem about traffic in Colombo. ‘the proud lady looked across from back of the ‘took to’’. But you are right, ‘took to’s’ or ‘3 wheelers’ do tend to stop every sudhu and ask where you want to go, while they never do with locals. Nevertheless, until you have seen a wedding party following a bride and groom, riding in an open three wheeler, or had to force a friendly driver to name a price or at leaste take ‘something’ for taking you home, then you have yet to visit Sri Lanka.
I blame tourists for any price hypes. As I always say, if we were all honest, these people and all Sri Lankan people would also show their natural innocence.
As for my home town. Where else could you be woken in the morning by ‘Lanahs’ (the Singhalese word for squirrel) wanting to be fed by hand, or pass elephants on the way to the shops? Greeted by nearly everyone by a friendly smile. Invited to sit a while in the post office and at every hardware shop, (all located on the same road) also asked to sit and have a chat while an assistant is sent to other shops to find what you need, and then given a 10% discount without asking.
All the small restaurants bake houses and food stalls having hot breakfasts ready as you pass by 9 am. Smells of curries, incense and the yellow saffron water the shop owners all throw onto the pavement outside. Town peoples all having sitting areas, to invite guests either just inside the door or outside, near the pavement, and always ready to make strangers feel like friends.
Everyone worshipping as they pass the mali Gawa, School children all in white and as good as gold, calling you ‘Uncle’. ‘heavy shopping today uncle’.
A meal for less than the price of sending a letter in most western countries. Monkeys in the trees, on walls and crossing roads. Numerous temples, alley ways, shops above, behind and under shops, containing, typists, lawyers, money changers, tailors, cobblers that can make a pair of shoes out of your old ones only in leather and for under 500rs.
Ancient books in ancient bookshops, latest Dvd’s and software, even if you have to listen to the sales boy telling you in broken English that he has ‘jivebunny’ (whatever that is).
Then I might sit by the lake, seeing the now three large monitor lizards or be joined by the airlanka pilot. The colonial cemetery made good by a man and his schoolgirl daughter. The cinemas, showing the latest Singhalese films to packed audiences. Tathi Paan bread with local cheese, Malu rhotti, 12 types of banana and different fruit everyday. Everyone except the tourists in their finest clothes (for town). Surrounded by hills, tropical vegetation, weather, a lake in the center of town. A nice long walk up the hill home to 8 wonderful dogs. Central location, old trains, bus fares that are almost free,
Now what more do you want, these are only things that spring to mind.
Mustn’t forget the ‘advice’ that is changed everyday on the wall of the Lanka pharmacy. Today; He who asks questions may be in for a surprise’.
Best wishes
Chris