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..

Temples are EVERYWHERE here in SriLanka. It's really quite overwhelming just how many there are and how old they are!!
On our big road map, there is a symbol for either a temple, or historical ruin site every centimetre or so.. Literally.. It would take you years to visit them all! We normally aren't huge historical buffs, but we've really enjoyed the ones we have visited.


At Unawatuna there is a lovely big Buddha and Dagoba built on the rock pinnacle at the end of the beach that offers beautiful views over both sides of the coastline. We met a lovely man who I don't think was able to speak, and through signs, gestures, laughs and writing on the ground he told us about the temple, but also about how it saved the lives of 450 or so people when the Tsunami hit. He said he was one of those people and they stood on top and watched as the waves just wiped out everything from below... 

Just inland from Dickwella (yes that's it's real name!) is the interestingly kitsch temple of WEWURUKANNALA. Now say that 5 times fast!

The temple is famous for it's HUGE standing Buddha, but also for it's "chamber of horrors" which depicts rather graphically what hell is waiting for those who dare do wrong in this life. 

Inland from Tangalla is the rock-temple-monasteru of MULKIRIGALA. 
It dates back to the 3rd century BC and is very similar in style to Dambulla and Sigiriya, in that there are layers of meditation chambers and temples built into the rocks over 4 terraces. It's quite the hike! At one stage I didn't know if we were going to make it all the way to the top! And honestly, the view from the 3rd terrace was actually much better than from the top....

But still a wonderful excursion into the countryside. 
The history and beauty here just continues to blow us away..

The southcoast highway is a constantly changing, constantly busy, constantly populated (mostly), constantly interesting journey.

Finally reaching Bentota south of Colombo, the constant sprawl of suburbia came to an end, and the beaches started to reveal theirselves. There is definitely no shortage of accommodation down south. Even the smallest village seems to have ample accommodation in it. 
The only road that goes along the coast is known as the Colombo-Galle Road and is just insane. It's a crazy, busy, dangerous road where buses overtake trucks and tuktuks on blind corners and the wrong-side of the road, at breakneck speed and refuse to slowdown even in the face of oncoming traffic.. 
For the first time, driving a tuktuk was a really hairy experience.. It's kind of scary when buses just start driving towards you full speed on your side of the road!!!

In some places, you are lucky enough to have the whole road and even the parallel beach to yourself! In other places, you aren't so lucky.. 
For the most part the road hugs the coastline which makes for a pretty beautiful drive!

Normally we like to visit a few different guesthouses before we decide where to stay, but on the southcoast, it would literally take years to visit them all... There are just too many. Which is great! It  means if you have your own transportation, you can literally stop anywhere, and be able to stay somewhere to stay!!

Or, if you are rushed for time, it's also possible to go from Bentota, all the way to Mirissa or even further if you like, in a comfortable 3 or so hours. If only there weren't so many inviting beaches along the way... 
We ended up stopping at 10 different beaches!! Which is pretty crazy when you consider they are actually so close to each other.. 
Oh the south coast.. sigh.. good bye. until next time..

It's a sad truth, but unfortunately, sometimes, your impression of a place can be really tainted by a bad guesthouse...
We had heard a lot of positives about Tangalle and were excited for it to be our last southcoast beach stop.
But we ended up leaving after one night, jaded by the lies of the guesthouse owner, and with a really bad flavour in our mouths...
As for the place itself. Well, the beach was nice enough but the ocean was way too rough to swim, and even on a calm day is too dangerous to swim at. Although there are lots of trees along the coast line, they aren't actually on the beach, so it's really hot.. 
And our pet peeve... The tourist town is so separated from the main town that if you aren't fortunate enough to have your own transport, you are really restricted to eating really expensive "skin tax" food... 
It wasn't a bad place, but definitely not our favourite either.. 

Oh, and whatever you do, DON"T stay at Gem's Garden...

ETA. Our friend Chris (AKA Yamahuh) asked us to expand on our bad experience so here it is. 
Pretty much from the moment we arrived the guesthouse owner lied to us. We were lured to his guesthouse with promises of nothing super special. Just a clean room with 2 big beds, free wifi (which we specifically asked about as I had some translation work due) and friendly advice. Upon checking in we were told as we were getting a discount on the room (low season prices but still expensive by comparison to other rooms in the country), that we could only use 1 bed. We were told there was hot water (there wasn't- we don't use hot water anyway, but if you are going to charge more for it, it should atleast be available..). I started using the wifi and catching up on work. After 1.5 hours we were told if we wanted to use anymore we would have to pay DOUBLE our room price because wifi is expensive, and he could show us his wifi bill, and it was moochers like us that were trying to drive him out of business etc etc.. Initially we were shocked so apologised and stopped using it. But then he started having a go at the 2 French girls who had also checked in at the same time. He told them they could ONLY use wifi if they ordered food from the restaurant (at stupidly inflated prices) and then, only for 1 hour while they were eating. They said they were told it was free wifi, and we said they had told us the same, to which the owner started tell them and us we were selfish and knew nothing and that ALL guesthouses in SriLanka were the same (even though we had been here for 4 weeks by now and had never accounted such rudeness). He then told one of the French girls she was the rudest French girl he had met and that she was an embarrassment to her country!! Suffice to say, we all left early the following morning.. Which was a shame, because it could have been a nice place, if the owner hadn't have been so rude...

All along the west coast of Sri Lanka you will find turtle "sanctuaries" or turtle hatchling farms, where turtle eggs are collected from the beach and moved to a "protective" environment. I use inverted commas as there is a lot of debate as to how these hatchling farms will effect future turtle populations. Turtles are known to return to the same beach as they were born to lay their own eggs and there is questions as to whether eggs raised in hatchling farms will retain that knowledge or not. 
We were originally planning to visit one but, in the end, decided against it.

In Hikkaduwa we stumbled upon this wild turtle that apparently hangs out in the shallows mooching freshly purchased seaweed from tourists. The turtle seemed pretty happy with his set up! And I mean, who wouldn't be? Freedom and free food? Wahoo!

Unfortunately not all the turtles in Hikkaduwa are so lucky...

The arm of pollution is never far from our sea turtles.. RIP little fella...

They say a picture says a thousand words.. I think i'll let the pictures do the talking for Polhena..

We chanced upon Polhena through a friend from Mirissa, Ruwan, who told us that you could see turtles. He then took it upon himself to call his friend there and organise our accommodation for us! We didn't know that though, so were quite surprised when we were hailed down on the road and told "You must be Roh and Rob! Hi baby Gypsy! Ruwan called me. Your room is this way."... 
Talk about a friendly welcome! And talk about an amazing room!!

Polhena beach was a bit choppy but apparently much nicer during high season. We still were able to see a few turtles directly out front though so that was cool.
The guesthouse was in an awesome place, not too far away from the hustle and bustle of Matara, but not too isolated either. We also had a kitchen we could use which was a wonderful luxury, and Gypsy had an amazing time playing in our fully enclosed little garden!!

The guidebooks generally give Matara a bad rap, but we actually quite liked it. It was a cute sized town with just the necessities and a lot of atmosphere. The beach area is really pretty and the monastery over the bridge was lovely as well. 
For us Matara and Polhena were the perfect combination of beach and city! A one night stop over quickly turned into 4... oops..

Hikkaduwa is yet another surfing mecca. But to us, it was all about the shopping!!

We found some amazing stuff! We even got some pants tailor made for both Roh and Gypsy. The quality and materials were fantastic, and the prices were amazing...  It was almost wrong, NOT to buy things!! Roh's pants were about US$6 each tailor-made, and $2 for Gypsy's. It was wonderful!

Hikkaduwa town itself was a mass of shops, overpriced cafes and restaurants (there was a burger shop selling burgers for the equivalent of AUD$14!!) and accommodation. The beach was hidden away behind the shops, and unless you were looking for it, you would probably drive through town without even knowing you were near the beach... It was an okay beach. Good for surfing beginners with a couple of cute cafes that you could tell would be pumping full of energy and atmosphere after night. 

We chose to stay outside of Hikkaduwa. First north at Akurala, and then south in Dodanduwa for a couple of days. Having our own tuktuk meant we were able to stay in nicer, cheaper places on the beach and commute into town, rather than be forced to pay expensive prices for not so nice rooms alongside a busy road.  

Dodanduwa was nice. We had a lovely little cabana on the beach, with cute sunbeds, and a sunset to die for! A very pleasant reprieve from the craziness of Hikkaduwa. And a perfect place to ponder the shopping... 

After spending a couple of days around Mirissa, we back-tracked to Akurala, about 10 km north of Hikkaduwa. Roh and I had found an awesome little guesthouse right on the water, for an awesome price, so we went to chill there for a couple of days. 

The guesthouse was ok. Nothing to rave about, and the beach was literally metres away. They even had an adorable little puppy for Gypsy to befriend. It was a lovely couple of days. Swimming in the morning, sightseeing in the afternoon, followed by another swim and playing with the puppy in between. Oh, and of course, hammock time!

We visited the Tsunami photo museum and the Tsunami memorial. It was both heartbreaking, and, actually it was only heartbreaking.. This is now the 3rd Tsunami affected country we have visited, and every time it just really drums home how fragile our existence really is. We need the water to survive. Yet, the water can also take our lives without prior warning. It was a very humbling museum - comprising only photos, newspaper articles and drawings by school children affected by it. But pictures speak a thousand words, and we left saddened but hopeful for the future of Sri Lanka - they really have recovered so well. 

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.

All of this hanging out with surfers seems to have had an influence on Gypsy!!
Not only does she still love the sand, but she insists on crawling all over and standing on every surf board she finds, AND she's no longer afraid of waves!!!