Andrea Hearts Traveling

So... the visit to Anuradhapura started by me telling Jonathan that I had to pay $25 to enter Pollonaruwa and him saying that I was wrong and that pretty much only stupid people pay the fees. I said that before there were ways to avoid paying the fees but not anymore and since all the entrance fees were so high I had only picked to visit Pollonaruwa. He took this information as a challenge and told me he would show me that I didn’t have to pay.

Once we had explored Jaffna Jonathan took me on a road trip on his motorbike to the North of Sri Lanka!.

My journey to Jaffna started with an hour and a half wait for a “luxury” express bus to Colombo that supposedly ran every 20 minutes… Could it be possible that 5 busses were late right when I needed them? I have learned to be more patient in Sri Lanka as things just work in their own time over here.

I decided to go down south to the beach just because that’s supposedly a thing you must do when you go to Sri Lanka.

I think my expectations of Yala were too high so I ended up extremely disappointed by the whole experience. They day of the safari I got picked up at 4:20 am and drove to the ticket office of Yala National Park. My driver drove like a maniac! He was going super fast, it was cold and I felt very much unsafe on the back of a jeep without a seat belt so I held on to the bars as hard as I could.

At around 5am we got to the ticket office and the driver went to queue to wait for the office to open at 5:30am. Once he got the ticket he drove like a maniac once again to get us to the gate of the park. When we left the office it was already light and as we drove we saw that there were at least 60 other jeeps parked all through the streets. We arrived at the gate and there was a huge line of jeeps waiting but our driver decided he didn’t want to be in the back of the line so he went to the side and then stuck his jeep in between two that were closer to the entrance. The two french girls and myself were embarrassed… why didn’t he just wait? What was the hurry?

It’s time to leave Ella and I decided to go to Tissamaharama (Tissa) and do a safari in Yala National Park. At first I didn’t really want to stop but then I decided that since I’m already here I should do it.

WHERE IS THE TRAIN?!?!?!

Well, rumor has it that this part of the train ride is the best one yet! Felix and I left the hotel at 7:30am to get on the 9:30am train. When we got to the station we got our 3rd class ticket for 60 rupees ($0.40) and went to platform 2 to wait for the train.

So sad to say good bye to friends but ready for the next adventure!

A couple of people from the hostel near Sirigiya said that Nuwara Eliya was not worth it, that we shouldn’t do it, that they even regretted stopping by instead of going straight to Ella. I looked at Felix and said “what should we do?” Felix just looked me so I said that I really wanted to go and that if we didn’t like it we could leave the next day.

The day I left to Kandy I was having a sort of lazy morning. I had breakfast, packed, sat on the swing upstairs and chatted with Laura, went downstairs and paid my bill, sat on the table and talked to more people, and by then it was late so I decided to wait for Felix so we could move on to Kandy together. Before we left I was approached by Jenny, a girl from the hostel I had met two days before, and she asked me about my plan. I told her we were going to Kandy but didn’t know where we were staying so she said they had two nights booked at a guesthouse, I immediately talked to Felix and asked if he was willing to share the room and split the cost, he agreed so I called the guesthouse and made a reservation.

Sri Lanka has many UNESCO heritage sites but their entry fee is crazy expensive so we had to choose which one to go to. After a lot of research and asking around we decided on Polonnaruwa, an ancient city an hour or so east of Dambulla. In the morning Felix and took the local bus over there, passing through nice villages and looking at beautiful lakes in hopes of spotting some wild elephants... we didn't.

Woke up at 4:30am to go to Sigiriya and see the sunrise.

Sigiriya is a rock temple part of UNESCO world heritage and its entrance fee is $30!!!! Whaaaat?!? Of course I didn't pay that much! Instead the night before we asked the hostel to arrange transport to Pidurangala, another big rock overlooking Singiriya that costs only 500rupees (Traveling on a budget means you have to pick and choose the activities wisely.)

I arrived in Sri Lanka at 10pm, went to the ATM, grabbed a SIM and off I went to find a tuk tuk to take me to my airport hostel.

I arrived in Sandakan airport (Borneo) and took a taxi to my "hotel", uncle Tan. I had looked up different places to stay but at the end decided to stay where my tour to the jungle was going to start but I think it was a mistake! The place was super run down and a little yucky! The bathroom doors didn't close, the shower had more mold than paint and the sinks were brown and one sink even had a slug roaming around it! In my 23 1/2 hours there I peed twice, that's how yucky it was!

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