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| Varkala at 7:30am |
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| Negombo at 7:30am |
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| Jesus at 7:30am |
In fact, the beach is so big and the hotels set so far back, that all them have swimming pools for theirr guests. I saw two foreigners swimming in the ocean for the first time this morning.
In Varkala there were never any helicopters landing on the helipad. Sril Lanka has a number of companies that run sea plane and helicopter air taxis that you can use to fly from one place on the island to another. I learned this too late, or I would have forked over the $200.
Here is a helicopter picking up guests from the hotel Simon wanted to stay at. I did not wait for a better shot because, in my experience, military policeman do not like cameras. I do not know who the guests were, but my guess is they were not a Canadian teacher and her 15 year old son.
Which brings us to the real issue- Sri Lanka has been great, but it is expensive. A tourist meal that would cost 2 dollars in India costs 20 dollars here and we are doing things on the cheap. I am not sure if it is because of the huge number of Arab tourists or not, but there is no limit to the fancy accommodation options here. A few that I have happened upon since my arrival are:
A villa experience for water sport enthusiasts that has rooms decorated with images of cultural revolutionaries including all your communist favorites 600-750 US. I think this is where all good communists stay when they are here: .http://www.villaredsrilanka.com/index.php
Mud huts and tree houses for tourists: http://boooyanatureresort.com/
Air conditioned tents with balconies: http://www.dolphinbeach.lk/
It is a little overwhelming for those of us who have been earning an 15 US a day.
The "Red" hotel is a puzzle. It's total luxury. Only a capitalist pig could afford to stay there, yet it's decorated with portraits of communist icons (and other "cultural revolutionaries" like John Lennon and Muhammed Ali...) One has to ask, is this run by some aging baby-boomer who "dropped out", tried all the revolutionary angles (dropping acid with Timothy Leary, playing sitar with Ravi SHankar, reading the Little Red Book) and has now found his/her pension to be lacking? I know, let's start a little hotel and milk all those capitalists for all they're worth, but let's decorate it with all that crap we've amassed over the years... Weird.
ReplyDeleteI am so glad someone else found it as weird as I did. I looked it up because I wanted to know if the hotel management intended the name and logo to scream communist party. Apparently they did and are willing to charge for it.
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