Sri Lanka is a lovely place, but it is spoiled by all the litter that lines the roads. Plastic bottles, bags, coconut husks, waste food, cans – all sort of small rubbish that gets tossed aside. It’s a great pity because there is so much natural beauty that is tainted by casual disregard. Another minus point is the lack of street lights and footpaths. Walking down the road at night you have to keep in to the edge of the road, watching for buses charging along at forty miles an hour, and making sure you don’t step in a drain. Local cyclists calmly go down the road at night without lights on their bikes, with tuk tuks overtaking them and big trucks coming the other way. It isn’t all tropical paradise here.
After breakfast we walked out of Mirissa down Udupila Road. The first quarter mile is lined with guest houses and small shops selling fruit, vegetables and fish. Then the paddy fields begin, vivid green and punctuated by white egrets hunting for morsels to eat. The fields and surrounding woodland are alive with life and noises. A big kingfisher sits on telephone wires, and isn’t the least perturbed by our noisy presence. In the distance monkeys feed in the trees, and peacocks call loudly across the paddy. A small thrush-sized bid hops on a branch, but it is bright yellow and black. In a dirty river a reptile several feet long swims slowly. I wasn’t sure if it was a small crocodile or a big monitor, but it turns out to be a turtle of some sort.
We returned to the beach, because it’s the main attraction here (apart from whale spotting). Watching people on the beach and playing in th surf is a very relaxing way to spend time. I have also been reading another sci fi book, the Medusa Chronicle by Stephen Baxter and Alastair Reynolds on the Kindle app on my iPad. It’s not a great way to read on the beach because the bright sunlight makes it hard to read the screen. But it is very convenient, I have several books I can chose from. I can also listen to podcasts that I download when I get good wifi. I forgot my headphones so have to listen with the iPad speaker next to my ear. It looks daft, but it works.
I went for a swim around some rock with my goggles on, but only saw a few striped fish, nothing very interesting. But I did eat a big steak of Sail Fish at lunch. The Sail Fish is the Ferrari of the oceans, it is almost a shame to eat it. But it had already been caught, and I wouldn’t want it to go to waste.
There are plenty of dogs in Sri Lanka, and I haven’t seen anyone walking a dog o a lead. Most appear to be feral, but they are all friendly. I don’t know much about dogs, they mostly look like Homer Simpson’s dog, Santa’s Little Helper.
I have just been for another swim, some of the breakers are really big, it’s like bing tumbled around in a washing machine . Probably 30 degree delicates wash.
timharnesstravels 