Sri Lanka: Day1

In the morning, we slept in because of the late night the evening before. We woke up around 9 or 9:30 and went out to the balcony for breakfast. Our hostess brought us tea and coffee in a cute service set, and we had a filling, mostly American style breakfast with fresh pineapple juice to boot.

After a quick shower and organizing our stuff, we took a walk around Galle Fort (pronounced Gawl). The town and its limits are actually much bigger than the Fort itself, but because our hotel was inside the Fort, it was a much quieter stay with quaint, small streets. We started on the lighthouse end and worked our way around the ramparts, watching roaming goats and talking with people who tried to sell us odds and ends and give us information about the area. One or two guys were trying to sell us old coins found from ship wreckage, while another was asking us to dare him to dive in the shallow waters. The things they do for tourists' money...

We moved on and sat down at the edge of a high wall, with our feet dangling over the sea water- a beautiful view. As the waves crashed against the rocks that broke the tide, we watched schools of fish and crabs fighting for rock space. Crazy. When we started to walk back to the hotel, we saw this gigantic (ok, maybe 3 feet long) lizard, birds, and stray dogs, as well as other young couples out for an afternoon stroll. We didn't linger because the rain clouds were coming, and in Sri Lanka, you don't mess with rain clouds. The night before, we witnessed a torrential downpour as soon as we left the airport.

We got back to the hotel, rested, read, and headed out of the Fort into the more modern area for a Thanksgiving dinner, Indian style. We had chicken biryani, rice with fried vegetables, chicken and egg soup, and sweet and sour chicken- not Indian, but it was good; there's nothing like mom's turkey. After a brisk walk through streets that were too dark, we made it to the hotel, read some more, and rested for the next day in our A/C room. We were totally on vacation!