Although we were literally run off the road by safari drivers who just couldn’t believe that we would come to Tissa and NOT do a safari, we didn’t do one. Nor did we ever plan on doing one. The main highlights of the Yala safari are elephants – tick, and leopards – wow.. 
But, unfortunately, as so often happens in suddenly touristy areas, the drive to sell a safari tour and show a leopard and in turn make a quick buck, has taken precedent over the safety and wellbeing of the animal. We have heard from people who did the safaris of the drivers calling each other and of 20+ jeeps surrounding the one leopard.. poor thing. As much as we would have LOVED to have seen one, that just isn’t a practice we can condone..

One of the most amazing things about travelling is the ease at which you meet like-minded people. It's so special to be able to make friends with people from all over the world.
We have met some lovely people here in Sri Lanka from lots of different countries, but every now and again you meet people you just click with. 

We met Mark and B at the hostel in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia actually! As all good conversations start, we asked where each had been and where we were going and were surprised to find out we were on the same flight to SriLanka the following day!! So we met up early and headed to the airport early, and the rest is history!

We stayed together in Negombo, and they rented a motorcycle at the same time as we rented our tuktuk. As they only had a month here, they travelled alot faster than we did, but we were still able to meet up with them in Anurandaphur for a couple of days, and then we were able to spend their last week in SL with them, hanging by the beaches! Thanks to them we also met Ben and Lola - an awesome Belgian couple with amazing musical talent. The 6 of us had some awesome fun, hanging out at the beach watching each other being pummelled by the waves, tag-teaming Gypsy-watch, and playing cards on the verandah with a rum or 3... Awesome times with awesome friends. Hope we can meet you guys on the road somewhere again soon!!
Safe travels!!

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.

Kevin just isn't awesome enough according to Roh...
So, upon spying a sticker shop, Roh did this to Kevin...

Yeah, it's a shameless plug but hey!?

Today we left Negombo in our funky wheels, aka, Kevin, and headed north. We didn't really have a fixed destination, we just wanted to go slow and see as much as we could, preferably along the quite back roads.

We strapped Gypsy into her car seat (which was in turn strapped to the bajaj (tuktuk) by a series of rope, straps and clips) and, with Roh at the helm and feeling much more confident with his tuktuk driving abilities, off we head!

Pretty soon we found a small road off from the main A3, and were happy to discover that the "minor road" marked on the map that followed the coast, was actually a beautiful and quiet road!!

We passed through many a tiny village with stall after stall selling fish, and surprisingly big fish at that, in the middle of the road. 

We were also surprised to find a whole new area of tourist resorts, mostly accommodating the Russian and German tourist clientele, and looking extremely out of our price range, but it was still a surprise. 
That being said, we still found alot of quiet beaches to take a quick and refreshing dip at!

It took us more than 4 hours to travel 100kms!! There was just so much to stop and see, and soo many inviting beaches!!
Eventually though, we decided it was time to stop. We found a wonderful little resort "Daluwa Lagoon Breeze Resort", a brand new little place about 10km down the road toward Kalpitya. They offered us a super cute little bungalow that looked straight out of the flintstones, and to top it off, the resort was right on the lagoon and had a gorgeous pagoda to sit and chill in.
The food was good. The sunset was beautiful. Gypsy LOVED playing in the grass and sand, and then we all slept really well in our flintstones house! A perfect first day with Kevin!