We just returned from a nine-day holiday in Sri Lanka with our 3yo son and 15month old daughter. If you are only there for six days then I would recommend going to one place and staying there for the most part.
The distances are short, but the driving takes *forever*. . .and I mean *forever*.
We spent the first night on the beach just north (?) of Colombo. The hotel (Brown's Beach, or something like that) was OK, but not spectacular. Nothing wrong with it per se. . .just no *wow factor*.
We drove up to the Heritance Kandalama resort the next day, which was a four hour drive. This resort was very nice and we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. The food was incredible and the staff was excellent. The food received mixed reviews on TripAdvisor.com, but I don't know why - it really was good. We booked a suite, which was well worth the extra $ because it meant that our kids could be in one room while we were in another.
The hotel is in the jungle, which means jungle animals are all around. If you are a paranoid helicopter parent then you will be terrified the entire time. I'm a fairly relaxed parent but found that I had to be on my toes all the time because there were so many real dangers (this applies to the resort as well as Sri Lanka in general).
Monkeys will come to your balcony, which is cool, but if you feed them then they can be quite aggressive. They're not afraid to snatch food out of a child's hand as he walks down the walkway (the entire hotel is open-air). Bats fly around at night, and I almost nudged one with my foot because I thought it was a frog sitting on the floor (oops). A large lizard tumbled out of a restroom hand dryer in to my cupped hands. Animals are everywhere and you just have to go with the flow. The highlight was finding a small non-poisonous snake in the room, which apparently isn't too unusual since they sent a fully-outfitted "snake catcher" to remove it.
Again, though, I highly recommend the Heritance Kandalama. I would go there with a 7yo - definitely. You can take a ride on the lake, explore the caves, ride the elephant, swim in the pools, and all sorts of stuff.
We spent four nights at the Kandalama and then drove down to the Heritance Ahungalla, which is several hours south of Colombo. This is a LONG trip, and I don't recommend doing it in one day. We left the Kandalama at 8:30am and didn't get to Ahungalla until 7:30pm. We did stop to see the Elephant Orphanage and the Tea Factory, but that's it. It's a painfully long journey and the driving is positively miserable. If anyone in your family gets carsick, bring the medication for it and be sure to have some barf bags handy. (I used them, I'm sorry to say.)
The Heritance Ahungalla was a bit of a disappointment, to be honest. The food was mediocre and the service was virtually nonexistent. The room was very nice, though. We booked a suite and ended up with a very large one. The hotel is tight with the water (only three bottles of water per day).. .vs the Kandalama, where they would give you all you wanted. The staff at the Ahungalla was also much more "right off the street" - a bit rough around the edges, poor English skills, clueless with respect to service in the restaurant, etc.
The beach at Ahungalla is nice, but there is a wicked undertow because the beach is so steep. We drove down to the fort, which was sorta cool but nothing to really write home about. We visited a sea turtle hatchery, which was a lot of fun; for ~US$10 they'll give you ten baby sea turtles to release in the ocean. We also saw a moonstone mine & jewelry store.
We hired a driver who was super-nice and tried very hard to show us his country. His English skills aren't that great, but we did OK with it. We did have trouble explaining to him that we couldn't have long busy days due to our two toddlers and he never really "got it", which was a continual frustration . .but we survived. We paid him US$400 for the nine (ten?) days we were there. I'll be happy to provide you with his info if you'd like. You should know that in his van there is only one seatbelt in the front and there are none in the back.
No matter who your driver is, you'll find that you'll be steered to junky tourist traps & restaurants. We got frustrated with that part, to say the least. The tourist restaurants were god-awful. . .I ordered grilled chicken one day and received the gnarly chicken back. We spent US$30 for two wimpy cheese and tomato sandwiches, a chicken curry (four bites of curry - literally), and a couple bottles of water. Ridiculous, especially considering the low cost of everything there.
One thing that you'll definitely want to remember: get heaps and heaps of small bills when you first get there. The hotels will claim that they don't have any, as will everyone that you want to tip. The elephant ride scam-artist that we used (not the one at the Kandalama) claimed not to have any change, so we gave him a larger bill to disburse to everyone than we would have given individually (I'm very tired - did that make sense?) As we pulled away I saw the jack*ss pull out his wallet and give change to the other guys. So, again, get more small bills than you could possibly imagine using because - believe me - you'll use them.
I think I answered this above, but just in case - if you'll only be there for six nights then I would spend one somewhere near Colombo, four up in Kandalama and the other near Colombo again.
I hope I answered your questions - let me know if you want the info for the driver or anything else.
We just returned from a nine-day holiday in Sri Lanka with our 3yo son and 15month old daughter. If you are only there for six days then I would recommend going to one place and staying there for the most part.
The distances are short, but the driving takes *forever*. . .and I mean *forever*.
We spent the first night on the beach just north (?) of Colombo. The hotel (Brown's Beach, or something like that) was OK, but not spectacular. Nothing wrong with it per se. . .just no *wow factor*.
We drove up to the Heritance Kandalama resort the next day, which was a four hour drive. This resort was very nice and we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. The food was incredible and the staff was excellent. The food received mixed reviews on TripAdvisor.com, but I don't know why - it really was good. We booked a suite, which was well worth the extra $ because it meant that our kids could be in one room while we were in another.
The hotel is in the jungle, which means jungle animals are all around. If you are a paranoid helicopter parent then you will be terrified the entire time. I'm a fairly relaxed parent but found that I had to be on my toes all the time because there were so many real dangers (this applies to the resort as well as Sri Lanka in general).
Monkeys will come to your balcony, which is cool, but if you feed them then they can be quite aggressive. They're not afraid to snatch food out of a child's hand as he walks down the walkway (the entire hotel is open-air). Bats fly around at night, and I almost nudged one with my foot because I thought it was a frog sitting on the floor (oops). A large lizard tumbled out of a restroom hand dryer in to my cupped hands. Animals are everywhere and you just have to go with the flow. The highlight was finding a small non-poisonous snake in the room, which apparently isn't too unusual since they sent a fully-outfitted "snake catcher" to remove it.
Again, though, I highly recommend the Heritance Kandalama. I would go there with a 7yo - definitely. You can take a ride on the lake, explore the caves, ride the elephant, swim in the pools, and all sorts of stuff.
We spent four nights at the Kandalama and then drove down to the Heritance Ahungalla, which is several hours south of Colombo. This is a LONG trip, and I don't recommend doing it in one day. We left the Kandalama at 8:30am and didn't get to Ahungalla until 7:30pm. We did stop to see the Elephant Orphanage and the Tea Factory, but that's it. It's a painfully long journey and the driving is positively miserable. If anyone in your family gets carsick, bring the medication for it and be sure to have some barf bags handy. (I used them, I'm sorry to say.)
The Heritance Ahungalla was a bit of a disappointment, to be honest. The food was mediocre and the service was virtually nonexistent. The room was very nice, though. We booked a suite and ended up with a very large one. The hotel is tight with the water (only three bottles of water per day).. .vs the Kandalama, where they would give you all you wanted. The staff at the Ahungalla was also much more "right off the street" - a bit rough around the edges, poor English skills, clueless with respect to service in the restaurant, etc.
The beach at Ahungalla is nice, but there is a wicked undertow because the beach is so steep. We drove down to the fort, which was sorta cool but nothing to really write home about. We visited a sea turtle hatchery, which was a lot of fun; for ~US$10 they'll give you ten baby sea turtles to release in the ocean. We also saw a moonstone mine & jewelry store.
We hired a driver who was super-nice and tried very hard to show us his country. His English skills aren't that great, but we did OK with it. We did have trouble explaining to him that we couldn't have long busy days due to our two toddlers and he never really "got it", which was a continual frustration . .but we survived. We paid him US$400 for the nine (ten?) days we were there. I'll be happy to provide you with his info if you'd like. You should know that in his van there is only one seatbelt in the front and there are none in the back.
No matter who your driver is, you'll find that you'll be steered to junky tourist traps & restaurants. We got frustrated with that part, to say the least. The tourist restaurants were god-awful. . .I ordered grilled chicken one day and received the gnarly chicken back. We spent US$30 for two wimpy cheese and tomato sandwiches, a chicken curry (four bites of curry - literally), and a couple bottles of water. Ridiculous, especially considering the low cost of everything there.
One thing that you'll definitely want to remember: get heaps and heaps of small bills when you first get there. The hotels will claim that they don't have any, as will everyone that you want to tip. The elephant ride scam-artist that we used (not the one at the Kandalama) claimed not to have any change, so we gave him a larger bill to disburse to everyone than we would have given individually (I'm very tired - did that make sense?) As we pulled away I saw the jack*ss pull out his wallet and give change to the other guys. So, again, get more small bills than you could possibly imagine using because - believe me - you'll use them.
I think I answered this above, but just in case - if you'll only be there for six nights then I would spend one somewhere near Colombo, four up in Kandalama and the other near Colombo again.
I hope I answered your questions - let me know if you want the info for the driver or anything else.
Happy Travels,
Expat Sueño