When most people think of Arugam Bay, they think of the beach and the surf... Not us.
Sure, the beach is lovely! Actually, it was more than lovely - it was beautiful. And I shouldn't say "it" because there are SOOO many beaches, most of them completely deserted, but all equally beautiful. 

The day after Roh's birthday we woke up and set about actually exploring Mirissa!
Mirissa is a little different in that the beach is pretty hard to get to, unless you are staying in a really expensive beach front place. It's back off of crazily noisy Galle Road which is nice though.  

Once you do find the beach, you find tourist land. Beach front cafe after cafe. Umbrella after beach chair. If you don't want to pay for shade, then you won't find any.. Luckily we visited early in the morning, so we were able to stop and take shelter without having to pay 300 rupees for a juice.. (Normally 150)

In the afternoon we visited nearby Weligama so our friends could surf. The beach was really beautiful, with lots of shady areas. Gypsy made a new friend and built her first cubby house! Be careful you don't get hungry though! A fried rice from the restaurant on the beach was going for 900 rupees!!!! (Normally 150)

Both Mirissa and Weligama, and even Midigama for that matter were quite nice. They are very much surfing areas though, so unless you like swimming in crashing waves, there's no real place to swim. And unless you are a surfer, the other surfers might not want to talk to you.. It's cliche, but unfortunately often true..
The beaches are clean. and especially in Mirissa, there is a good variety of accommodation available. We were able to find an awesome cabana for a really good price. Food however, was much harder. If you are nearing the end of your travels, or you have a more flexible budget than we do, than the fresh seafood and meals in the beachfront restaurants are probably delicious! For backpackers on a budget like we are, paying 3 times the normal price even for a cup of tea wore our budget very thin. We did find some nice, cheap and delicious local restaurants in Weligama, and one not-so-expensive place on the main road in Mirissa though, which was a great relief. 
It was nice, but not what we would call beach-paradise.. But that's just us.

Following on from my blog last night about ridiculously high entrance fees here in SriLanka, I thought I would give you a little update on costs here so far.. So here you go.

Kevin - The cost of renting a bajaj (tuktuk) greatly depends on how long you rent it for. We rented Kevin for 2 months, so were able to get the price down to 900rupees (US$7) a day plus US$50 for comprehensive insurance for 6 months. 
We also needed to get our international drivers license changed into a SriLankan driving permit which cost 2800 rupees (US$24) valid for 1 year.
We get about 25km per litre and petrol is about 160rupees (US$1.50) a litre. We fill up every morning as the bajaj only holds 8 litres and on average costs us between 500-800 rupees a day to fill, depending of course on how far we drove the day before. 
Repairs - knock on wood, so far the only repairs we have needed is to fix the brake light, which cost a whopping 60 rupees (US$0.40). Hey big spender~~!

Accommodation- don't believe the guidebooks. Cheap accommodation is available and remarkable easy to find. Guesthouses and homestays are everywhere, and even if you don't see the ubiquitous "rooms" sign, you can just ask in any town and they will be able to point you to somewhere to spend the night. We spend between 1500 and 2500 a night (US$12-23), but usually 2000 rupees, and have always had a private bathroom, and 9 times out of 10, 2 double beds in the room with mosquito nets!!

Food - Food costs varies greatly from restaurant to restaurant. Tourist restaurants with spaghetti, pizza, pancakes etc, exist in the major towns but are stupidly expensive and usually, not overly nice.. We avoid them, however pancakes and omelettes were a welcome way to ease Gypsy into SriLankan food for the first couple of days.
Mostly we eat at "hotels" as restaurants are called here. We usually get 4 paratha and a thali (a mix of dahl,curry and 2 veg), along with 2 cups of tea, for between 150-250 rupees (US$1.20-2.30).
Lunch and dinner is the same. Gypsy loves fried rice and Kothu Roti so we eat alot of these too. Prices are around the same. 
It's really interesting how the food culture changes so much here. In the north string hoppers are for breakfast, but in the central highlands, they are for dinner!
Drinks - Water is pretty cheap, about 70 rupees for 2 litres. Fresh fruit juice ranges from 150-200 rupees, and tea is between 30-40 rupees a cup. Ginger beer (super delicious and refreshing) is 50-70 rupees, pre-mixed juice is expensive! 110 rupees for 500ml!! Coke etc are 50-70 rupees, and last but not least, beer (only available from dedicated "wine stores" usually with a compulsory deposit of 20-30 rupees for the glass bottle) are 150-200 rupees for 700 ml.  According to Roh, the Lion is quite nice but the "Bison extra strong 8.8%" tasted like petrol.. Arak is just gross.. cheap but gross...

So that makes a daily budget of 2000 for accommodation, 500 for petrol, 1500 for food/drinks, and 1000 for tuktuk rental.  A total of 5000 rupees (US$45) for a family of 3. Not too bad..

Taking all of this into consideration, the entrance fees for everything are just ridiculous. The smallest temple or national park is at least 1000 rupees each!! As much as the government thinks it is making lots of money this way (which I'm sure it is from the package tourists), it's also losing alot of money from the backpacker tourist and I hope they wake up to this soon and re-instill the historical SriLanka pass, so us on a budget can afford to see all of the sites Sri Lanka has to offer too.