Day 4 Negombo – Dambulla – Habarana

Day 4

Monday 3rd August, 2026 - Negombo - Dambulla - Habarana

Today was overcast with showers of rain. An early morning start leaving the hotel at 8:15am after breakfast which was ok, we had a freshly cooked omelet.

It was a crazy 1.5 hour bus ride with a coffee stop at a cafe along the way, thankfully there are a couple of other coffee-holics on tour with us ! The coffee was nice as was Graeme's cinnamon danish ! It was so enjoyable, we actually got another coffee to go !

Arrived at Dambulla Cave Temple, a Buddhist monastery, at midday. This was an included activity - so entrance was paid for. This represents a very holy site for the Sri Lankan Buddhist as it was one of the very first temples built. It was approached by a very steep uphill walk. Shoes off at the entrance, and we wandered around the 5 rock temples at our leisure.

There was troop of monkeys there and the traditional bodhi tree and of course lots of Buddha statues in the caves. Left here at 13:30.

We then made our way to what was described as a family home for a traditional Sri Lankan lunch, which was actually set up as a restaurant off the beaten track called Yamee Yamee. Lunches are generally served in buffet style with a number of dishes and rice, including spicy chicken, dried fish, jackfruit, beans, chillies etc. We can't understand why they are always served just warm and not hot. Desserts were coconut and caramel balls with treacle and buffalo curd - yum!

On the road again at 14:30 for a fast drive to Minneriya National Park for the optional (@ 23,000 LKR - approx. 85AUD per person) safari. Everyone in our group optioned in and it turned out to be a worthwhile 2.5 hour tour in safari jeeps around the national park, viewing lots and lots of elephants, monkeys, birds and some deer. The only down side was the high number of jeeps in the park carrying tourists, and at times at good viewing spots there were up to 50 jeeps vying for good positions.

It was a very enjoyable, action packed day. After a large breakfast and lunch, Tania and I didn't go for dinner, 3 large meals in a day is far too much for us. We did go for a walk and find a good coffee place, an old Kombi van converted into the barrista's bar, and just around the corner from our hotel. The hotel is IORA Resort - not very good though- we had one broken power point out of only 3 in the room, a thin sheet only on the bed, wifi was hopeless and the floor had been recently waxed and we were getting red dye on the soles of our shoes. We definitely didn't walk around the room with bare feet. Oh well - some are good - some are not !