Lanka!
Ceylon! Beaches! Trains! Roti! Whales!
Since I couldn’t go to Tibet for the week, I decided to go to Sri Lanka instead because it’s close, I saved money on changing the plane tickets, and I’ve always heard about how nice it is.
I flew into Colombo, but I had two connections – one in Kolkata (Calcutta), and the next one in Chennai. I had a nine hour layover in Chennai, so I got a hotel room close to the airport, and I was bitten my mosquitoes all night😩 Not the first or last time that has happened on my trip. My only solace was that I was soooo tired that I would quickly go back to sleep after each time I was bitten!
When I got to Colombo the next morning, I took a local bus to the train station, about an hour away from the airport, and then I took a train to Mirissa. The trains are super cheap… they’re also super old, super crowded, and super hot! Mirissa is a beach town on the southern end of the island. The trip was 6 hours, and when I got on, it was completely packed (even though I had a ‘second class ticket’), so I stood up in the aisle for the first hour or two.
full.
standing room only
But, some of the trains are actually full – literally, can not possibly have any more people in them, and there are guys hanging out the doors. I’m glad I didn’t experience that. I actually enjoyed the train rides, packed, sweaty, and everything… hard to explain why, but maybe because it was the connected feeling I had with the other people on the train, or maybe it was feeling less like a tourist. Anyway, I liked it😃
Also, the view out the windows for part of the trip from Colombo was ridiculous…
how can you complain when this is the view?
out train window
don’t fall out
by the tracks
The first town I went to was Mirissa – it’s just a small, chill place, and the marina has a lot of whale watching companies.
mirissa beach, by my hotel
view from my $20/night room’s balcony
The ocean rocks and waves kind of remind me of California coastline. And the sand on every beach that I went to was soft and white😍
mirissa beach
mirissa beach pano
beach pano
mirissa:)
I went whale watching with a company called Raja and the Whales because they have a high success rate of seeing whales, and they give you half of your money back if you don’t see a whale:) There are BLUE WHALES and sperm whales in this area, and I really wanted to see a blue whale.
The trip ended up being around 7 hours, and the waves in the Indian Ocean are pretty severe, so a lot of people were getting really sick! Ew:( I felt nauseous on and off, but it wasn’t too bad.
fishermen in indian ocean
my pic of dolphins:0
dolphins
taken by someone on the boat with a good camera:)
The dolphins were wild – front flips, totally out of the water, double twists – they must’ve been in a really good mood when we spotted them😄 They were hard to get pictures of, but we saw probably four different groups, the biggest group had maybe 20-30 dolphins. Really cool. AND, after hours and hours of driving out to sea, we saw a whale!
sperm whale!
my pic of WHALE
byebye
It was a sperm whale, not a blue whale, but still – really huge and cool to see. We saw it for maybe two minutes. It was using it’s spout to shoot out water, and then it dived down and away. The sperm whales stay under water for up to 45 minutes at a time, so we didn’t see it again after it went it under. I was just happy I got to see a whale – had never seen one before☺️ Also, on the way back, we saw a sea turtle swimming on the top of the water😆
mirissa – on the way back to the marina
That was the two days I had in Mirissa, and after that I moved north up the coast to an amazing town called Galle. Another packed, sweaty train ride😅 And then, I hit one more beach town – Aluthgama – before I left out of Colombo.
Next up: Amazing Galle Fort!
Pokhara, White Water Rafting, BUS FIGHT!
Trek is done, and rafting has begun!
I didn’t want to leave Tatopani, could’ve stayed in the little village longer, just sitting and looking at the scenery! We took a local bus back to Pokhara – about 1.5 hour ride…
Local bus
I was sooooo happy to see a heater again that I had to take a picture of it😂 You bet it was on non-stop while I was in the room.
omg, a HEATER!!!
Pokhara is a cool little town, but for whatever reason, I didn’t take hardly any pictures of it:/ But these are the ones that I did take, from the hotel…
view from hotel
pokhara pano
view from hotel
seatbelt!
The next morning, we left Pokhara and went on a local bus to a place on the Trisuli River between Pokhara and Kathmandu to go rafting:)
i love the flags!
ready to go!
yes, helmet.
excited
floating
babu😔
Babu = Nepali for son/younger brother/grandson. The kid was 15, and he is working at the rafting company, no school. They were really nice to him though, and he’s learning english, so I don’t doubt that’s the best thing for him, given his situation that was explained to me.
using their pully to get hay across the river
kind of baby + our cool guide (not baby) + just a baby😔
lock in feet please
paddles up!
beach break
The locals pan for gold on the river bank, and after rafting, it looked goldie on my pants😀
goldie looking flakes on my pants
Rafting was scary and fun… and cold! But, I warmed up quick afterwards BY EATING DAL BHAT.
After rafting, Harry and I walked up to the highway and waited to wave down a local bus to bring us back to Kathmandu. It was about a two hour ride, and I guess the bus driver was tired and testy… because he totally GOT IN A FISTFIGHT WITH ONE OF THE PASSENGERS! This is a picture I have from the bus – I was sitting in a tiny seat directly behind the driver, and the other people are piled into the not-actually-seats space in the front of the bus.
bus passengers (sardines)
As I am sitting in the seat behind the driver, he starts screaming at a guy who is standing just inside the open door of the bus. And they are screaming back and forth at each other. Then it stopped for a few seconds. Then they started screaming again. All the while, driver is still driving. And then, while driving, he is huffing and puffing and decides to take off his jacket. I knew that meant a fightfight was going to happen😂 And then, a few minutes of screaming later, the driver slammed on the brakes, put the bus in park, jumped out of the bus, slammed the door, and ran around the bus to the other side faster than I’ve ever seen anyone get out of a vehicle. Insane. So then he and the passenger are both off the bus for a few minutes, then the driver comes back (no passenger), turns on the bus and starts driving WILDLY in lots of traffic, and then he starts getting into an argument with one of the guys that was working on the bus, the ticket-taker. Sheesh.
While this is all going on, I didn’t know anything they were saying to each other; I just knew that they were really pissed off. So, Harry told me afterwards what the fight was about – As we were arriving in Kathmandu, a passenger on the bus wanted the driver to stop so he could get off. But the driver refused to stop because it would just be an extra stop he would have to take. The passenger started yelling, and the driver didn’t back down, and it all just escalated from there (as it will do when testosterone is involved). When the ticket-taker was yelling, it was because the driver accused him of not being loyal and supporting him😆 I was happy then because 1. they didn’t also get in a fight 2. because we got off the bus soon afterwards and 3. it wasn’t America, where the dudes would’ve shot each other.
Excitement, excitement on the local bus😃 That night, my last masala tea😩
masala tea
After staying in Kathmandu for the night, I left Nepal the next day. The Kathmandu Airport has a unique security screening process… they have one line for men and one line for women:
kathmandu airport security – women only line😂
And for whatever reason, 75% of the people flying were men, so they had this lonnngggg line and had to wait forever, and I just walked right up and went through security😂 I have no idea why it’s like that, but it benefitted me that day!
I took pictures of some mountains from the plane; I’m not sure which mountains they are:
from plane window, flying out of kathmandu
not sure which mountains?
Miss you, Nepal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’ll be back!
Next up: Sri Lanka!
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