Activities Tangalle & Surrounding Area

Places to eat

The Amanwella luxury hotel is a 10 minute tuk tuk ride away, with a lovely beach bar for lunch, lots of beauty treatments and massage, a wonderful dining room and fabulous pool and cocktail bar. You need to call ahead to book any of the above.

Il Camino italian restaurant is a five minute walk down the beach, serving italian food but is not always open. Manahara bungalows located next door to Kurumba House has a restaurant serving good local food and beer.

Lunch can be arranged at Kadju House, which is a private house a short walk down the beach.

The Saliya is a charming local restaurant offering delicious fresh fish and very good chips about 15 minute tuk tuk ride away.  It is mentioned in the Lonely Planet guide and incredibly good value.

Treatments/massage

Thai Massage with Matthew Gale

This form of massage is for almost everyone and is proven to have tremendous results, both physical and mental.
All one needs to prepare for a Thai massage a set of soft cotton pajama/yoga like clothing, a few free hours and the desire to feel better both physically and mentally.

Thai massage has its origins from both China and India and has been practiced in one form or another in Thailand for over 1,000 years. This massage is done fully clothed while lying on a mat directly on the floor in a sequence of 5 positions allowing the practitioner to manipulate virtually every accessible muscle in the body.

About Matthew, the practitioner
Matthew Gale was born in the USA but went east in 1989. It was in 1996 during a trip to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand that he first experienced Thai massage. From that first visit until this day he has studied annually with a number of teachers offering different styles of Thai massage and deep tissue therapies.
Matthew has lived in Sri Lanka since 2003 and resides on the southern coast when not visiting northern Thailand or other reaches of the globe spreading the knowledge of Thai Massage.

Massage/beauty treatments with Natalie Rogers

For massage, body scrubs, pedicures and other beauty treatments Natalie Rogers is an accredited body therapist and spa professional, specializing in holistic massage and highly experienced in an array of health and wellness techniques.
She has recently gone free-lance after running the Amanwella Hotel Spa for several years.

Along with creating a relaxing environment for the client, Natalie blends a variety of techniques into a unique treatment that’s designed to heal and rebalance the body, aiming at easing sore muscles, tension release, improvement of circulation and flexibility. Each treatment is customized to the needs of the client.

Originally British, Natalie considers Sri Lanka to be her home and has lived between Tangalle and Kandy for the last ten years.

Places to visit

Mulgirigalla Rock Temple

Situated 35 minutes north of Tangalle, Mulgirigalla is a monastic site on an isolated 210m-high rock which rises almost vertically out of the surrounding forest. The rock was the site of an important discovery – the ola-leaf scripts discovered in the 19th century. These scripts offered a key to the translation of Sri Lanka’s most informative ancient text, the “Mahavamsa”. At the base of the rock temple are the monk’s living quarters and a fairly steep path leads to the temple. The stepped path is separated by platforms where cave temples featuring murals and Buddha images can be explored. There are about 500 steps to the top but the views are breath-taking (literally).

Turtle Watching at Rekawa and Turtle Conservation Project

Just 30 minutes east of Tangalle, Rekawa is renowned for its long, undisturbed beaches and mangrove skirted lagoons. The beach near Rekawa is one of Sri Lanka’s most important marine turtle nesting sites where five of the world's seven species of marine turtle come ashore to nest throughout the year. All five species of turtles that nest in Sri Lanka are either endangered or critically endangered. Amongst them is the Leatherback turtle, the largest of all the sea turtles, which can grow up to 3 meters in length and weighs up to 600 kg. It is at Rekawa beach that the Turtle Conservation Project (TCP) has established an “in situ” nest protection and research programme, allowing the protection of nests where they are laid by the female turtle and for the hatchlings to scramble down to the ocean immediately after emergence from the nest. The project at Rekawa is the first of its kind in Sri Lanka. Turtles are most likely to come ashore under the cover of darkness. Join the people at the Turtle Conservation Project during their night watch in anticipation of that magical moment when a turtle comes ashore and lays her eggs.

Bundala National Park

Located 75 minutes east of Tangalle, this area of open scrub around the coast offers great opportunities for bird-watching (with around 150 reported species) and the occasional sighting of elephants and crocodiles. The salt pans attract a vast number of migratory shore birds, making this 6,216 hectare park one of the most important wetlands in Sri Lanka. The best time to visit Bundala is between November and March when the winter migratory birds arrive. Numerous grey langur monkeys populate the larger trees and in the scrub jungle you may also come across jackals, hares and spotted deer.

Uda Walawe National Park

Situated 90 minutes northeast of Tangalle, this is one of the island’s most popular national parks totalling 30,800 hectares in size and bordering a reservoir. It is best known for its elephants (estimated to number around 400, including six tuskers) and bird-watching opportunities. It is primarily open parkland traversed by a main river and numerous streams which makes elephant sightings particularly accessible. Often the pachyderms can be seen in herds of up to 100 or more. Other animals which may be sighted here include spotted deer, langur monkeys, jackal, wild boar and water buffalo.

Yala National Park

Some three hours east of Tangalle, Yala National Park is world renowned as one of the best parks to observe and photograph leopards. Although it has one of the world’s densest leopard populations, it still requires good luck to see one of the elusive creatures in its natural habitat.

Covering an area in excess of 126,000 ha, the park is divided into 5 blocks, of which only Block One is open to the general public. The area consists of scrub jungle and brackish lagoons with stunning rock monoliths scattered throughout the park. The many different habitats provide a unique experience to anyone visiting the park and support a great variety of animals. The often low-density vegetation provides ideal conditions for safaris as it allows a clear and unobstructed view of the wildlife.

Yala National Park has a substantial elephant population along with many other species like spotted deer, sambur, wild buffalo, sloth bear, mongoose and crocodiles to name a few. Also more than one hundred and thirty different species of birds can be seen, ranging from the lesser flamingos to Paradise Flycatchers, Crested Hawk Eagles and the rare Black necked Stork.
 

Whales & Dolphins of Mirissa  (December – April)

South of Dondra, Sri Lanka’s southernmost point, is one of the best locations in the world for seeing pygmy blue whales and both blue and sperm whales together. In addition, Bryde, Fin and False Killer Whales are often seen and there have been several sightings of the stunning Killer Whales (Orcinus orca) in December and April due to the migration of whales between the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal.
The period between January and April with its calm seas is also a great time for dolphins.