Insight Guides Sri Lanka - Sri Lanka Travel Guide

Insight Guides

• Publisher: Apa Publications
• ISBN:
  9781789192551
• Edition: 9
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Travel

Insight Guides: all you need to inspire every step of your journey.

From deciding when to go, to choosing what to see when you arrive, this is all you need to plan your trip and experience the best of Sri Lanka, with in-depth insider information on must-see, top attractions like Galle Fort, Kandy and Yala National Park, and hidden cultural gems like Sinharaja, Yapahuwa and the Jaffna Peninsula.

Insight Guide Sri Lanka is ideal for travellers seeking immersive cultural experiences, from exploring the villas of Galle, to discovering Sri Lanka seafood.
In-depth on history and culture: enjoy special features on Region, Festivals and Wildlife, all written by local experts
Invaluable maps, travel tips and practical information ensure effortless planning, and encourage venturing off the beaten track
Inspirational colour photography throughout - Insight Guides is a pioneer of full-colour guide books
Inventive design makes for an engaging, easy reading experience

About Insight Guides: Insight Guides is a pioneer of full-colour guide books, with almost 50 years' experience of publishing high-quality, visual travel guides with user-friendly, modern design. We produce around 400 full-colour print guide books and maps, as well as phrasebooks, picture-packed eBooks and apps to meet different travellers' needs. Insight Guides' unique combination of beautiful travel photography and focus on history and culture create a unique visual reference and planning tool to inspire your next adventure.

Travel Tips: A–Z

A

Accommodation

There’s a huge range of accommodation in Sri Lanka, from basic family guesthouses offering a handful of simple fan rooms through to five-star palaces and dozens of alluring boutique hideaways, often in magical beachside or rural locations.

In the main tourist areas, budget travellers will find plenty of inexpensive guesthouses, most of them family-run. The best places offer comfortable lodgings, good home cooking and the chance to rub shoulders with the owners, grab some insights into local life and enjoy the kind of spontaneous hospitality which you won’t find in more upmarket places. Rooms in most guesthouses come with attached bathroom, fan and (except in parts of the hill country) mosquito nets; some also offer air-conditioned rooms. Most places now have hot water, and pretty much everywhere has Wi-fi.

Mid-range hotels are relatively thinner on the ground, although again all the main tourist centres boast a decent selection of places halfway between the island’s simple guesthouses and the fancier hotels. These include traditional government Rest Houses, many of which have now been attractively upgraded, but which often preserve something of their former colonial ambience.

Large-scale four- and five-star hotels can be found throughout the country. Many are clustered along the west and south coasts, and there are also a few upmarket city hotels, plus hill-country and Cultural Triangle resorts. These generally offer stylish rooms and a good array of facilities including pool, restaurants and bars, and often an Ayurveda centre or spa.

A beguiling alternative to the mainstream five-stars is offered by the island’s burgeoning number of boutique hotels, usually with fewer than 20 rooms and often in marvellous natural settings – remote stretches of beach, idyllic tea plantations and the like. These offer visitors the chance to sample contemporary Sri Lankan style at its most memorable, with superb design, an intimate atmosphere and top-notch cuisine – equal to anything available anywhere in Asia, although at predictably expensive rates. Many boutique hotels occupy suave contemporary buildings, usually following the tropical-modernist template established by Geoffrey Bawa, although some can be found in restored colonial-era coastal and hill-country villas, offering an atmospheric taste of old Ceylon complete with all its period trappings.

An alternative (sometimes cheaper) to the island’s boutique hotels is provided by the numerous private villas (a kind of Sri Lankan equivalent of the French gîte) that have sprung up in recent years. Many of these are found along the south coast around Galle, Unawatuna and Tangalla, and there’s a further selection in the hill country, many of them in restored colonial-era tea planters’ bungalows. For a good idea of what’s available see www.villasinsrilanka.com, www.boutiquesrilanka.com or www.reddottours.com.

Hotel chains

An increasing number of the major international chains now have hotels in Colombo (including Shangri-La, Hilton, Taj, Ramada and Mövenpick, plus a forthcoming Hyatt and ITC Maurya), although there are few international names outside the capital bar the new Shangri-La in Hambantota and the Taj at Bentota. A few big names in Colombo excepted, most of the island’s hotels are run by local companies, although quality and service are generally of international standards, as indeed are prices. The big three are Jetwing Hotels (tel: [phone]; www.jetwinghotels.com); Aitken Spence (tel: [phone]; www.aitkenspencehotels.com), who operate a number of hotels under the “Heritance” brand; and John Keells, who operate hotels under “Cinnamon” (www.cinnamonhotels.com; tel: [phone]) brand. Other local operators include Amaya Resorts (www.amayaresorts.com), Tangerine (www.tangerinehotels.com) and Serendib (www.serendibleisure.com).

Making a reservation

Popular places can fill up very quickly during peak season, so it’s well worth booking as far in advance as possible. The vast majority of Sri Lankan accommodation, from humble guesthouses to five-star palaces, can now be reserved online, offering instant guaranteed reservations at the press of a button. Bear in mind, however, that at larger places you may get cheaper rates by checking the hotel’s own website reservations system, while smaller guesthouses may offer discounts if you book with them directly by phone or email, since they don’t have to factor any online commission (usually costing them around 15 to 18 percent) into their price. If you do arrive somewhere without a reservation, it generally pays to avoid the suggestions of touts and tuktuk drivers, who will either be trying to flog substandard accommodation or take you to a place where they get commission – which will then be added to your bill.

Recommended agencies, especially for more upmarket hotels and villas are: Boutique Sri Lanka (tel: [phone], www.boutiquesrilanka.com), Red Dot Tours (tel: [phone], www.reddottours.com) and Sri Lanka In Style (tel: [phone], www.srilankainstyle.com). Major Colombo hotels also have representatives in the arrivals section of the airport.

Rates

Sri Lanka is no longer the bargain it once was, and nowadays it’s difficult to find any sort of accommodation for under $15–20 a night for even the most basic double room (even a single bed in a hostel can sometimes cost more than this) – while more upmarket hotels can easily top $200. Cheaper places quote prices in rupees, although more expensive places usually give rates in dollars (while along the west coast you might also occasionally see room rates quoted in euros).

Room rates vary somewhat throughout the year depending on the season and your bargaining skills, with prices sometimes drop as much as 50 percent from April to September/October.

Wherever you’re going, it pays to be aware of taxes. The government currently levies around 17 percent in a range of taxes on hotel rooms, while many places also add a 10 percent service charge. Cheaper places usually quote a “net” rate inclusive of all taxes, although more upmarket places may not. Check in advance to see what is and isn’t included in the quoted prices – an extra 27 percent added to your bill at the end of your stay in an exclusive boutique hotel may come as an unexpected, and not entirely pleasant, surprise.

Admission charges

Admission charges vary wildly. The top cultural sites, such as Sigiriya ($30), Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura (both $25), attract hefty charges, as do the isla...

Table of contents

• Sri Lanka’s Top 10 Attractions
• Editor’s Choice
• Introduction: Pearl of the Indian Ocean
• Lie of the land
• Decisive Dates
• Ancient civilisation
• Colonialism and Kandy
• Independence
• People
• Contemporary society
• Religion
• Insight: Shrines and offerings
• Festivals
• Dance and music
• Art and architecture
• Insight: The art of Sri Lanka’s muralists
• Food and drink
• Shopping
• Wildlife
• Introduction: Places
• Colombo
• West coast
• South coast
• Kandy and around
• Insight: Elephants: Sri Lanka’s friendly giants
• Hill Country
• Cultural Triangle
• Anuradhapura
• Mihintale
• Polonnaruwa
• Sigiriya
• Insight: Ayurveda
• East coast
• Jaffna and the north
• Travel Tips: Transport
• Travel Tips: A–Z
• Travel Tips: Language
• Travel Tips: Further Reading