Lazy Vacation in Sri Lanka 20 days late December-Early January, General Advice

hi,

Good choice on planning to meet up in Sri Lanka. It is a pretty amazing country to travel in, lots to see and do from beaches to trekking to national parks and historical ruins. it is also pretty cheap too. 20 days is a nice time frame and you can see a good bit and have time to relax and do nothing. In December/January the best weather is in the west and south (the east coast, north and ancient cities have monsoon season and more chance of wet weather). Instead of staying in Colombo a lot of travellers stay just north of Colombo in Negombo (only 15-20 mins in a taxi from airport which should cost $12-15). There is a long strip of beachside hotels/guesthouses restaurants and bars. For beaches you should head down the west coast to the south, lots of beachside towns to chose from. December/Janaury is the high season so accomadation will need to be booked in advance. I think off the south coast is whale watching season in Janaury so I think that should be done. A safari in one of the national parks like Yala could also be an option. You would also have time to got to Kandy and spend a few days in the Hill Country and climb Adams Peak (about 5000 steps). Public transport is very cheap but can be slow going espcially on the trains. A popular way to get around is to hire a car and driver, this costs about $50 a day (not sure if that is posible with your budget. we hired one for a few days to when we knew public transport wasnt possible or was going to be slow. Having a car and driver is very handy for seeing the ancient cities in the Cultural Triangle. The sites like Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa and Sigirya while may be wet in December/January and are little bit far up are worth seeing and could be done in 3 days with a car and driver. A sample route you might consider would be
Negombo - bus - Kandy - car & driver - Cultural Triangle and back to Kandy - train/bus - Hill Country - bus - South Coast - bus - West Coast

Hi,

Sri Lanka is great.

You will love the nice beaches (we went to the south beaches). Besides the beaches here are the things that you definitely should see:

Sigiriya lion rock: http://planet2see.com/2017/10/31/getting-dizzy-of-the-sigiriya-lion-rock-fortress-heights/
Dambulla cave temples: http://planet2see.com/2017/10/23/rock-cave-temples-of-dambulla/
Kandy (especially for the tooth temple): http://planet2see.com/2017/10/21/what-to-do-in-kandy-sri-lanka/

General link for your first days: http://planet2see.com/2017/10/09/first-days-in-sri-lanka/

Hi there,

Cinnamon hotels are a good option as they are 4+stars and reasonably cheap. We stayed with them in Trincomalee, Kandy, Habarana and Bentota. If you want to just visit a few places then perhaps organise with Cinnamon and they will sort all of your transfers as well. They have hotels near all the major sites as well as some nice beachside places. We highly recommend the Trinco Blue at Trincomalee. Trincomalee is super chilled out and a great spot to either start or end your trip.

If not then travelling overland independently in SL is fairly easy and cheap. There are trains, buses and cheap car transfers available. Journey times are max 5-6 hours between major sights. Sometimes just 3-4 hours.

Our fave places in SL:
- Sigiriya Rock
- Anuradnapura
- Adam's Peak
- Ella + surrounding area
- Yala National Park
- Trinco

If you want more info on any of these place or where we stayed have a look here: https://www.atlasandboots.com/destinations/sri-lanka

Have fun!

Peter & Kia
Atlas & Boots

Trincoamalee and the near by beaches are great, loved Nilaveli beach however the OP’s time frame of December/January is the monsoon season in that region so best avoided and go south or west for beach time