Said goodbye to Umatuma this morning, after a lovely few days, heading north for…a beach! Oh yes. There’s a lot of ’em round here. But this one offers access to Secret Island. Though the moniker seems a bit of a misnomer, what with it being on all the maps. Not to mention the fact that it isn’t even an island. We’re planning to check it out on the morrer. In the meantime, I just remembered a little gem from yesterday: we arrived at the bike park above Jungle Beach, to have our fee taken by a wizened ancient probably even older than me. As so often, “Where you from?” As ever, “London.” “Ah,” he said, “British. I love Jane Austen.”
Slightly fraught start to the day. We’d allowed an hour to get to the station in Galle – plenty, surely, for somewhere barely 20 minutes by tuk tuk. But that’s once you get one. The first to accept our ride took five or six minutes to get from seven minutes away to five minutes away, before disappearing altogether. The second did no better. Time was slipping away, and with only one train today, we were getting a bit nervous. Eventually the nice guy at the hotel managed to track one down. Then we hit traffic. Ended up arriving at the station with barely five minutes to spare, praying for no queues. No queues. Phew. Platform two.
We headed off down the platform past one third class carriage after another after another. Finally, two minutes before the set departure time, and just before we reached the one second class carriage at the front, the train started to move. We both clambered on, managed to get through the standing passengers, and reached the door to second class. Which was locked. Managed to squeeze into the open doorway just outside the loos, and sat down on plastic bags we fortunately had to hand, the floor being damp with (Virle neologism) toilet juice. Then spent a happy half hour watching the world whizz by, before reaching the first station, where we grabbed our bags, got off, ran up the platform, to discover second class was even more crowded than third had been. Too late to turn back, we stood for the rest of the journey, cursing our decision.
We’ve now arrived in Aluthgama, visited the beach – a vast expanse of windswept sand with almost noone on it, and had a fun swim in the surf before heading back to the room for a shower and a change before heading back to the beach for a beer. It’s hell, but someone has to do it.
Sunset on the beach, with microlights above and anglers in the surf and a big, big sun sinking slowly into the ocean. Then we treated ourselves to beers at a place overlooking the river, watching fruit bats swoop around in the dusk, before an excellent dinner (and a very handy chat with our waiter, who put us on to the Sri Lankan Railways app). Then back to the room, where Virle is researching our prospects for the next week or so, figuring out how best to get from here to Ella, given uncertainties over post-typhoon railways.
