Arugam Bay

A surfers’ paradise, we found Arugam Bay (Eastern coast fairly south) in serious off-season. This meant not a whole lot of tourists. It also meant lots of places closed.

The local beach is the only protected area we found as we strolled further south

This quite large (locally speaking) fishing boat got rammed by the ocean a few months ago. No one injured fortunately.

We took a tuktuk tour north of town. Rice is harvested after two yearly monsoon seasons and is the major staple produced in the country.

Top: manual dehusking of rice after it is dried, it is then put in bags, then onto women’s heads; then into 100 kg bags (we were told).
Bottom:Thrashing machine

Savouring tropical fruit is an ongoing pleasure.

Baby pineapple, rambutan; fruit stand makes wonderful coconut lime sodas

Not suitable for swimming but beautiful shores

Didn’t notice…’to another muslim’ at first; locally made curd which is delicious especially with a bit of local honey. Bottom: rice drying on road.

Second day we went north in a tuk tuk to seek the beach and take a late afternoon marsh boat ride.

More beach seeking..waters beautiful but too rough to venture in as a swimmer.

Barry finds local young men secluded from prying eyes and samples their preferred brew.

Traditional small fishing boat; rice paddies

An arranged paddle for the three of us was the day’s highlight. The marsh was quite shallow and our paddler did a lot of digging into the marsh floor: