Negombo, Sri Lanka

Negombo, Sri Lanka

This is big city, which has located in a close distance to Katunayaka airport, which takes 15 or 20 mins by vehicle from the airport. The coastal area of the city is a famous tourist destination, which consist with lot of hotels and a huge beach area. There are different type of hotels and restaurants, which have been ranged under different star classes. You can select your accommodation from these categories. Prices of the hotels varies according to the star class of the hotel.

I know much more details about this area since my home town is located very close to Negombo city. This city is pretty much important since this area did not get affected too hardy from the Tsunami effect, which was undergone in 2004. From this this city, it is very easy to travel to all the other tourist areas in northern part of the island, southern part and the central area of the country by using the high ways.

If you are interested in visiting this area, I suggest you get your accommodation in the beach area since you can enjoy swimming, sailing, diving, and you can try lot more sea foods from different restaurants. Along with that there are beach parks and you can enjoy boat ride in Hamilton canal, boat rides in lagoon, sun set etc. If you like to see how people catch and trade fresh fish then there is huge fish market in this area. You can visit this place if and only if you can bear the smell of fish. If you go to this area sometimes you can find “Penahati”, which are small kind of sea animals. It depends on the period of the year since they appear only in one period of the year. When I was so small, I used to find them under the sand with my parents. It was so fun.

The other thing is people make lot of tasty dishes from these small sea animals (Penahati). At the same time, you can see how people make dry fish in this coastal area, which is not common in all the other countries.

Besides that, most of the time this city host live musical shows, carnivals etc at night. But if you have an idea to go there please be careful since sometimes it gets more crowded and turn in to a fighting battle.

Restaurants in this area offer variety of sea foods in different tastes such in spicy taste, fried taste etc. I must say that even though some restaurants offer seafood under high prices, I guarantee that you can find many restaurants, which offer these foods under a reasonable price.

Besides that, you can find lot of souvenir shops, jewellery shops, gem shops in this area. They offer unique designs and traditional handmade items for a reasonable price. You can find typical Sri Lankan gifts for your relatives and friends. If you want travel to other places or to the city area you can rent bicycles, motor cycles and three wheelers (Tuk Tuk) besides the public transportation. But I must say if you are going to use a motor cycle then be careful since traffic is really a burden in Sri Lanka and sometimes roads are not safe. So please pay your attention well. If you go to Sri Lanka, visit this coastal area. (I have extracted some beautiful photos of the area from the internet)