Tangalle’d up in blue

(The blue is the sea and sky, tenuous eh?)

Ah, Kuwait Airport… How I hate you so. Billie and I have gone all-in hating on Kuwait since our recent delay debacle. It’s a crappy country to look at, land in and frankly its a crappy airport with a heavily overpriced Costa outlet and that’s IT. Yuck.

Anyway. Unfortunately, we’re back in Kuwait with a 2 hour wait for our transfer flight. I’ll try to throw my mind back to when the sun danced on my face and sand crept into every available space.

Day 13, Tangalle

We arrived at ‘Sanji’s – The Beachside Cabanas’ via air conditioned car, which is a bit like showing up at the club in a limo, but only in the sense that you’re arriving somewhere in a vehicle. We were greeted by the nervous manager. Soon a more confident man approached (perhaps Sanji himself? We never found out…), told us they were preparing our room; they’d put aside the sea view cabana for us because we were staying a long time – score! He also mentioned the nervous manager was new. The nervous manager flapped about uncomfortably trying to take payment. We never saw Sanji again, and the nervous manager was our guy from here on out. He was nice enough but had a horrible habit of hovering and timing everything awkwardly. He’d come over to the table mid-dinner and ask how we were, we’d politely respond “good and you? Oh how fabulous” etc. but then he’d just hover there, and eventually would be a silence long enough for us to resume eating. Just as the bite enters mouth he’d strike up a new line about whether we needed taxis or anything. We would finish our bite of food and assure him we were fine whereby he’d sort of apologise while backing away, probably bumping into people and things along the way. He also had a habit of standing up if you walked past him, hold eye contact and open his mouth to speak, and then just give up the attempt, nod almost as if he’s in control of himself, but then you see him crumple back into his chair in self-loathing afterwards. These encounters would happen a few times a day. Needless to say we arranged most activities ourselves.

Sanji’s is a series of 8 cabanas, each with private, funkily designed, outdoor bathrooms. The establishment then has a restaurant and pool which front onto an enormous private beach, used only by the people staying at the few other similar places down the stretch. Truly it was paradise. We sat on loungers for the whole day and read our little socks off.

Tangalle is a town on the Southern coast of Sri Lanka, pretty much right at the bottom of the island. Our actual place was in Rekawa, not even really a village, 30 mins away, but Tangalle was the closest place so we considered ourselves in Tangalle. The South and West coasts are where Sri Lanka’s beachy tourists go. I must say everywhere was fairly quiet, tourist wise. We saw our fair share of ‘em but was surprised there weren’t more. Entire strips of perfect beach lined with palm trees and only a few people on it. Put that beach anywhere in Europe and you wouldn’t be able to dip your toe in the water lest someone bite it off in defence of their beach space. To sum it up, this south coast area was something of a beach paradise, where there was town, things were nice and bustling, with cool beach bars serving beer and pina colada, where there was no town was just perfect white sand and blue sea. In this post, please be aware we spent 75% of the time just chilling and reading on a beach. But a few exciting things did happen…

Day 14, Tangalle

In true ‘we’ve made it to the relaxed bit’ fashion, we awoke to our 7.15 alarm, had an early breakfast, and met the Tuk Tuk out front. This fellow would take us to met Sam, our surf instructor, for our very first surfing lesson. Sam was a lovely chap and once the Tuk Tuk had delivered us to his surf van, took us to a secluded beach with small waves, perfect for beginners. We spent 30 mins or so on the beach practicing the right movements for standing up on the board and then took to the sea. After 2 failed attempts, I stood up and surfed a (small) wave! It was a glorious feeling. Billie was having a bit of trouble so after 45 mins Sam took her back ashore and taught her a new technique; a few more attempts and she was up on the board too! I spent a fair amount of the time failing to stand up but Bills and I both thought it was a good result for our first sesh. We both sustained some injuries. For me, a buggered up little finger. Over the next couple of days it would turn purply green and hurts to move. Billie got a cut on her knee on her very last surf… It bled profusely but all was well. We both felt severely battered and bruised by the sea. We drank a coconut each and made our way into Tangalle.

It was my dream to be scooting around from beach to beach in this bit of the journey, so after an iced coffee at a beach bar, I left Billie on a lounger and went in search. I was back within 20 mins astride a green beauty of a scooter. We scooted back to Sanji’s for lunch and a chillax.

Because today was our 3 year anniversary (of when we became GF & BF), we scooted back into town for drinks (singular for me) and dinner, which was lovely and romantic and everything we ever wanted it to be.

Day 15, Tangalle

Today we would beach hop. A blog written by some trendy (but far less eloquent than me) travellers said their favourite beach was Hirikiteya. We’d also read about another, Goyambokka. We decided to scoot the hour to Hirikiteya and then visit Goyambokka on the way back. Hirikiteya was actually touristed up, clearly because it was a big surf beach. It was lined with people and the sea was full of people sitting on boards awaiting the next decent wave. We found a spot and hung out for a bit and then had a lovely lunch at one of the many restaurants in the area, catering to us hungry tourists. After a while we decided to surf, because, you know, we COULD surf now. We hired a board and took to the water. It soon became apparent that we COULDN’T surf… At least not without Sam present to face us towards the beach and give us a push. Billie cleverly realised this fairly quickly and returned her board. I was more persistent and sat out there for a good half hour. A lot of ‘proper’ surfing appears to be waiting for waves (not a prob on our learner beach). While they wait everyone sits on their boards. I hadn’t had much practice at this, so I’d be there sitting on it amongst 50 odd other surfers, on relatively still water and then I’d just lose balance and tumble in noisily. I’d then clamber back on only to fall off again about 30 seconds later. All extremely embarrassing stuff. Anyway, when the waves finally came, I failed at surfing multiple times and was tossed around the beach like a rag doll. To be fair, most other people were pretty crap too, so that was heartening. We decided we’d made our mark on this beach and to scoot on to Goyambokka. Which was wonderful and quiet and exactly what we wanted. We sunk a beer and sat and read for 2 hours before sundown, before returning to Sanji’s.

Day 16, Tangalle

This was pretty much a chill day, except we went across the road (major effort) for lunch and then across the road again (it was a crazy day) in the evening for a massage. I had an ayuverdic massage which is a Sri Lankan classic and are advertised all over the place. They use hot oil and go to town on your muscles, full body style. The guy was fairly butt centric in his massage, and there was a lot more bum massaging than I’d experienced before, but I let him get on with it. Billie had an aromatherapy massage with all lavender and the like. Billie mentioned her massage lady was fairly bum focused too, so we reckon that’s just the Sri Lankan way… so watch out for that.

Day 17, Tangalle

We had to have the scooter back by 12.30, so we relaxed on the beach till 12 and then had a fairly tense ride to Tangalle, praying what tiny bit of fuel we had remaining would get us there, and to the petrol station within. It did. We then spent the ENTIRE day chilling on Tangalle beach in a beach bar, drinking and eating too much and dipping in the sea when we fancied it. It was lovely!

Each day we’d do a walk down the beach at sunset. The sun is HUGE in Sri Lanka, and so is the moon actually. It was always a highlight of the day.

Day 18, Colombo

We checked out of Sanji’s and got a car to Matara, where we then grabbed the train down the coast to Colombo. The train was a fab experience again. It was super hot so we spent a fair bit of the journey sitting out the side door. As we approached Colombo, the sun started to set and the sea showed itself proper. It was splendiferous. The approach to Colombo as we went past shacks and then to richer parts, was interesting to gaze at as we sped by. I seemed to see so many scenes out the door that summed up the trip in a nostalgic sense: a boy practicing his cricket swing, a dog gang with some puppies, birds flying off in huge groups to roost somewhere, people relaxing on the beach…

In Colombo we passed the time by drinking. The highlight was when a mariachi band came to our table, asked where we were from, and when we answered, immediately broke into ‘Yesterday’ by The Beatles.

We sleepily made it to Colombo airport where we queued 4 times for about an hour each. I got shirty at a man for trying to cut in and shamed him publically to the back the queue. All part of a Brit’s time in a Sri Lankan airport, really.

Sri Lanka is just the most incredible place and Billie and I miss it already. We’ll definitely come back to do the North and the West sometime soon. Home has its own things to look forward to though; family, friends, pets and farm animals, so that’ll be nice. Stopping in Kuwait is good for perspective… yeah we’ve got to leave beautiful Sri Lanka, but at least England is better than this shit-hole… (too far?)

Thanks for reading my blog! Looking forward to the next adventure… I’m thinking Africa. Thoughts?