A visit to Sri Lanka is a good chance to explore the different parts of this gorgeous island. You'll land in Colombo, but there's no need to stay there too long before heading inland to Kandy to visit the tea plantations and then to the south coast to the warm tropical waters of the Indian Ocean. If you need to stay overnight (which is probably a good idea to get the feel of the place, stay at Cinnamon Red Hotel. It's close to the action. Check our review of it here.
COLOMBO
Barefoot Garden Cafe - 70 Galle Road, Colombo
A pretty cool eatery for the afternoon with good food, good service and good jazz style music by a trio. Awesome atmosphere and energy. Book a table in the shade if you plan to stay otherwise you may end up in the sun for hours.
The Garden café is an oasis in the heart of Colombo and an ideal venue to relax with friends. The blackboard menu displays the daily lunch specials. Try the legendary Black Pork Curry or the notable Spinach Quiche and we also have a fine selection of wines and beers. There's also a retail shop at the front bearing the same name. Check the Barefoot Cafe website here
Cinnamon Red Hotel - check out the review here.
KANDY
Ashburnham Estate - gorgeous tea plantation homestead. Check our review here.
Elephant Orphanage - 2 friends have loved this place but it didn’t do much for us. If you want to see elephants fed bottles of milk it might be your thing.
Temple Of The Tooth - once again it’s not really worth it. $20 each to get in and I didn’t really see much value for money other than to discover that there probably isn’t actually a tooth in the box that’s inside the box that’s inside another box, that’s inside another box. But it’s a pretty important place for Buddhists.
MIRISSA
A great seaside town that’s pretty chilled out. Not much to do apart from laying on the beach. Get up early to get a sun lounge along the beach (like by 9.30am ish) or just lay on the beach. Water temp is about 27 degrees - just perfect. We stayed at Triple 0 Six Hotel, see our review here.
Watch the sunset from the hill next to the Buddhist temple (above image). It’s down a lane way across the road from Triple 0 Six Hotel. Or you can get to it from the beach.
Zephyr
Sit in the beach and rub your ties through the end as you have dinner. I had the spaghetti carbonara which was delightful. Maybe don’t have the cocktails as we are a bit sus in the alcohol in them - both times came away with headaches later that night. Seriously.
Karma
On the beach, but tables are not on the beach. Food was okay.
Bodega Spa
A good massage if you’re after one. About $30 for 90 minutes. Not a bad deal.
Triple 0 Six Hotel - Check our review here.
GALLE
Heritage Club has great wood fired oven pizza, but no alcohol.
The Galle Fort Hotel is also nice and worth a visit, but I think we had the most expensive G&T's we've ever had there. But it was certainly in a gorgeous hotel and we felt faaaaabuloous while sipping out G&T's.
