Paradise Found

Off the northernmost tip of Sumatra lies the tiny, rural island of Pulau Weh. Reaching this haven required some time and effort: a twelve hour bus to the north, a becak to the pier, a ferry to the island, and a harrowing, eye-watering, ear-popping motorcycle taxi across the island. But it was worth the work to reach Weh Island’s rustic (budget) tourist digs.

Waters vary from crystal clear to impossible blues and greens, enticing swimmers to find sweet, cool respite. Waves gently caress shores rocky and sandy alike, lulling the hammock-bound into swinging afternoon naps. Afternoon thunderstorms patter on tin bungalow roofs. For me, the bungalow balcony offered a perfect spot for morning yoga, and the affectionate local cats were ideal cuddle partners for those afternoon naps. It is in many ways postcard-perfect.

Even the negatives on Weh Island yield positive results. The herds of goats that love to clip-clop down onto our bungalow porch provide us with incredible goat’s milk cheddar for morning omelets. The impossibly incorrect maps lead us on a drive over the entirety of the magnificently picturesque island. The rough speedboat ride that sent us hurtling over six-foot swells through a thunderstorm and left us soaked to the bone allowed us to snorkel with dancing schools of fish, color flickering in the sunlight; it also ended with our being gifted a 25-pound fish, a gut-busting feast, even for six people.

With its minimal tourist infrastructure, herds of goats, and numerous mosques, Weh Island isn’t the ideal paradise getaway. It was rustic, our tour guides also made their living fishing, there wasn’t hot water or air conditioning, we forgot to reapply sunscreen, and the beer was absurdly overpriced and hard to find. But it was gorgeous, the people friendly and helpful, the food delicious, and the cats plentiful. I truly couldn’t ask for anything more. 

Coasting

With only a few short days left in our Sri Lanka adventure, we started to wander up the coast. The goal was a leisurely journey, as we were no more than three hours from Colombo.

First, we went to Bentota. Unfortunately for us budget-conscious travelers, sometime between the printing of our mysterious bootleg Lonely Planet and our arrival on the island, Bentota decided that it was some sort of luxury resort town. We told a tuk-tuk driver than we were looking for something cheap. He repeatedly took us to places that wanted $25 a night or higher, insisting the whole time that many tourists come, pay 5,000 rupees, 10,000 rupees a night ($50-100), beautiful on beach. He couldn’t understand that it wasn’t a personal insult to Bentota or his family, just a budget issue.

Eventually, we got back on a bus heading toward Galle and hopped off in the town of Amblanagoda, where a tuk-tuk driver immediately took us to a big, rambling guesthouse overlooking the ocean. We took the first room they showed us, huge with a oceanview balcony and a roomy mosquito net, only 1,800 rupees per night. Downstairs, a wedding reception was winding down, so we were invited to have a free buffet lunch (we’re pretty sure they were just hoping we would burst into flames because of the spice) and hop into family portraits.

Amblanagoda is famous for its carved masks, both theatrical and for folk medicine, so we made the rounds of the mask museums in town. The masks ranged from simple affairs in vibrant colors, representing various ailments, to massive carved garudas and cobras meant for blessings and luck, to even bigger, more elaborate king masks. Hand carved from balsa wood, and then delicately painted, the construction process was done assembly-line style, each artisan with a niche.

The beach at Amblanagoda was lovely to stroll, but hazardous (okay, probably fatal) if you were looking to swim. Even at low tide, the sand was a narrow strip, frequently interrupted by natural rock walls and fallen palm trees. Not surprisingly, the beach saw very few visitors, making it less-than-ideal if you were looking to open a resort. However, the seclusion and solitude caused us to spend the rest of our Sri Lanka days lounging in Amblanagoda. 

Old World Splendor

The old city of Galle, located on the southern coast and the final World Heritage Site on our itinerary, is a neighborhood surrounded by massive fortress walls. Elsewhere along Sri Lanka's southern coast, the vacant shells of former homes, piles of cinderblock rubble, stand ghostly tribute to the havoc wreaked by the tsunami. But, in Galle’s old quarter, colonial-style buildings, all shutters, archways, and balconeys covered with flowering vines, flank the streets.The fortification, serving little modern protective purpose, actually saved the old quarter from damage during the devastating 2004 tsunami.

A meandering gridwork of cafes, guesthouses, and giftshops, Galle is also graced with walk-able fortress walls. We walked the majority of the walls, perched high above the crashing waves, taking to the streets whenever construction prevented passage. A beautiful vantage point for watching the sunset over the ocean, the fortress walls seemed popular with tourists and locals alike.

Wandering through the local Antiques Museum, we witnessed local men hand carving gems, something done by machine these days. But Galle strives to keep alive traditional handicrafts. We were lucky enough to see an elderly woman making lace by hand, sun-wrinkled fingers flicking bobbins over and under each other, a craft that is quickly fading away as the older generation disappears in Galle.

Full of textiles, antiques, tea houses and beautiful ocean views, Galle was a lovely place to waste several days roaming, looking for local knickknacks or napping the day away.

After Trauma, Tranquility

For nearly thirty years prior to 2009, Sri Lanka was knee-deep in civil war. In the north and northeast of the tiny island, the militant Tamil Tigers fought for an independent state to call their own. Curious to see post-war recovery, but lacking the time or fortitude necessary for a bus to Jaffna way up north (overland travel in Sri Lanka, given its relatively small size, is inanely slow), we settled on Trincomalee. As a northeastern coastal town, Trinco experienced its share of the fighting.

Our guiding light on our journey was a $4 photocopy version  of the Sri Lanka Lonely Planet purchased in Vietnam, with no discernable publishing date (the handwritten 2012 on the back wasn’t very convincing) and a glossary/index that didn’t always match up to correct page numbers. However, making reference to the end of the war in 2009, we knew it couldn’t be too outdated, its information only moderately inaccurate. In it, Trinco was described as “Baghdad on the sea,” a place where the businesses were all shuttered unless you banged on the clang-down garage doors, where there were few to no guesthouses, and where frequent military checkpoints at bus and train stations and armed roadblocks made travel tedious.

What we found couldn’t have been more different.

Yes, there were some roadblocks, but they were barely manned and everyone just drove around the gates and barbed wire. A number of police officers and military men were stationed throughout the town, but they simply smiled and said hello as we walked past. The town was open and friendly, businesses lining every street, and people constantly wanted to talk to us (and not just to sell us crap).

Curled around a sparkling blue bay, Trinco seemed a city at ease. Residents cruised past, more on bicycles than in cars. The bustling market was stuffed with all manner of fruits, veggies and fish, and was home to a small herd of sambar barking deer. Dilapidated buildings, sun-bleached, paint peeling and flecking away, cement chipped and broken, flanked the streets, but no more than in other parts of the developing, third-world island. 

Trinco’s beach, if not for the garbage that invariably litters all third-world beaches, was borderline postcard-perfect. Crabs sideways-skittered and dipped into the sand. Local women dug for clams, using the headscarves as makeshift clam bags, and Lanka families swam and frolicked in the surf, fully clothed for modesty’s sake.

Perched high upon a cliff, at the very tip of the bay, sits Trinco’s famed Hindu temple. After passing through a military fort, which seemed to double as reservation land for the swarms of sambar deer, and trekking uphill among Hindu worshippers, we came to the temple. Hindu temples are elaborate to the extreme; intricate representations of deities cover the surface, climbing skyward, arms and legs akimbo. Incense wafts, prayers are muttered, foreheads dabbed. Beyond the ceremony, sea and sky stretched endlessly. 

To see this seaside community blossoming, full of life and positive energy, after many long years of devastation was incredibly uplifting. Not only was it far from being the shadowy, militarized post-war experience we were expecting, it turned out to be a lovely couple of days lounging by the beach and exploring the town. 

Islanding, Cheap and Rustic

While our New Mexicans were here, the final thing on their Thailand Bucket List – tigers, ruins, elephants, and monkeys accomplished – was to spend some time on a beach or an island. And, as islands are something that Thailand has in abundance, but travel time was something we were short on, we decided on Koh Chang at the strong recommendation of some friends.

Relatively undisturbed in terms of development and tourism, Koh Chang is far quieter than anywhere we had been in Southern Thailand, although not for lack of effort. The majority of the island is covered in vast complex cliffs and meandering evergreen and jungle mountains. The road that rushes along the perimeter of the island, although failing to make a full, connecting circuit, is something akin to a rollercoaster, with its steep inclines and hairpin turns.

The lack of development has led to a spike in the number of luxury resorts on the island, intentional on the part of the developers with an eye for big bucks. However, if you venture slightly farther to Lonely Beach, cheap accommodation and moderately priced meals abound. A decent beachfront (or had there been more beach and less boulders, what would have been beachfront) bungalow ran us 300 baht a night, and even included a mosquito net over the bed and a hammock out front. We fell asleep to melodious waves lapping at our doorstep, our wallets not suffering horribly.

We did a full day of snorkeling, this time with no major catastrophes. Win and Ansel rented motorbikes to cruise around the little island, while Jenny and I hopped a taxi to the resort-quality beaches to lounge, read, and have some lunch. It was over-cast, but as we were both slightly burnt, it was perfect. It was a lovely, relaxing way to finish off our unpaid vacation, and it cost far less than a trip to the other islands.