This 15-day trip immerses you in the must-sees, must-tastes and must-meets of beautiful Sri Lanka. You’ll summit UNESCO World Heritage-listed Lion Rock in Sigiriya, cycle through sprawling ancient city ruins in Anuradhapura and wander the massive granite Buddha carvings in Polonnaruwa. Have lunch with a Tamil tea worker in their home, relax with a cold beer and your feet in the sand in Mirissa and hike between plantations and villages in Haputale. This is the best of Sri Lanka!
Explore during this 10-day tour Sri Lanka high and low with this fascinating round-trip starting in the capital, Colombo, and taking an inland loop that covers all the main historic, cultural and natural attractions of this magical island. Discover a world of lushlandscapes, picturesque lakeside cities, historic temples and ancient citadels. Meet some of the friendliest and gentlest creatures in the animal kingdom andenjoy the lush green tea plantations spread through the hill county.Conclude the tour with a few relaxing days on the beautiful beaches of Bentota.
Great trip, itinerary and tour leader
Would’ve liked a bit more time in Kandy- having an afternoon on the first day perhaps ? Maybe can streamline the tea plantation and shorten theearlier stop to the gem place.
Wonderful trip with Harsha Gayal Perera. Sri Lanka is a very beautiful country. We highly recommend Aitken Spence Travel Agency for the tour guides they work with. Our tour included the visit of the ancient capitals of the country, the most important temples and also focused on the current culture and society. A mixture of nature and history, which allows you to learn a lot from this experience. Our vacation was perfect thanks also to our guide Gayal, who made it unforgettable. Aitken Spencer Travel should be proud to have a person like Gayal. We invite all readers not to worry about choosing Sri Lanka as a travel destination full of history, legends, spirituality, colours, sound and wonderful people. You can trust an expert tour guide like Gayal and you won't run into any challenges. Enjoy this country! ! !
Great tour with Aitken Spence for Sri Lanka. We were picked up from the airport by a transfer service wityh our guide, Oscar, too. Very efficient organization, good drivers, bus in excellent condition and kept scrupulously clean throughout our tour. All assistance provided when required. Recommended.
We have just spent a week in Sri Lanka for our honeymoon and use Aitken Spence as our chauffeur guide for our trips. We had Rodney as our chauffeur guide and I have never met someone so lovely, calm, patient, helpful and passionate. He is a credit to the company and made our visit to Sri Lanka very relaxing and took care of our every need. He was punctual every day for our meeting times, enlightened us with all sorts of information about Sri Lanka during our trip which was very interesting and made sure we were comfortable all the time. The car was comfortable and very clean every day and had enough leg room and space for all our luggage. We fit a lot into our 1 week stay in Sri Lanka and it would not have been the same without using Aitken Spence. I would 100% recommend this company, all you need to do is sit back and relax while everything is taken care of for you!
It is not often after a two week holiday, I am not ready to leave and get home. I went by myself and I could have repeated the holiday easily. George our guide was incredible, full of charm, humour & wit he was totally unflappable and his knowledge of his country was encyclopaedic encompassing politics, economics, flora, fauna, religion and animals. He worked tirelessly to ensure we all made the most of our time. Sri Lanka is an amazing country and the fun, laughter and camaraderie we all experienced will live with me for a long time.
Both parts of this trip wee amazing but the tour leader, Nala, for the Sri Lankan part was amazing. We were seeing and doing so much of Sri Lanka but his efficiency and effectiveness at keeping us all informed and inspired throughout was seamless. He was knowledgeable, fun, and thoughtful with all of our group. He was careful to make sure everyone was happy and felt part of the group, and was aware of everyone's particular interests.
Nala made sure that we all knew what to expect in the day's itinerary but also added in extra activities if there was time, or the opportunity arose for example, a large banana market where the cooperative owners were happy to hear our questions and have phottaken.
We would thoroughly recommend Nala as a tour guide- everything he did was designed to keep us all happy and he was exceptional in this.
Looking back at our photos now we've returned to the UK we can't believe the amount we saw and the amazing experiences we had on this tour. Sri Lanka is an amazing beautiful country with some much going on - we only scratched the surface. Our tour leader Cham worked so hard to make sure that we had everything we needed, resolving our problems and sorting out food for our fussy son! His knowledge about Sri Lankan history and wildlife was immense. He even found the best place to buy genuine Sri Lanka cricket shirts for the sporty members of our group. The only thing we'd change was the pace of the second half of the Sri Lanka leg of the trip. The first half gave us time to chill and bond as a group, as well as hang out in the pool at Giritale and play cricket. The second half we moved every night and covered a massive distance, though interesting, this was quite tiring (especially for the kids), so we'd suggest that a two night stop in the middle of this element would resolve this issue easily. This was clear in the notes, however, as was the high chance of not getting the train. The pace did slow considerably for the Maldives element, with a lot of time on our boats travelling between reefs. The snorkelling was quite frankly mind-blowing, and even the more nervous swimmers loved it. The crew were fantastic, and the food was delicious. The guide knew his stuff, and made sure we had great snorkelling experiences. Our only criticism of this part of the trip was that splitting the group when we'd got to know each other and were getting on really well was disappointing. There were larger boats, and we'd have preferred to be on a single boat given how long we spent travelling separately. The crew did what they could to mitigate this by tying the boats together when we moored for snorkels, meals and overnight and that was great. All in all a thoroughly enjoyable trip, and with a few very small tweaks it'd be perfect!
The highlights of Sri Lanka and the Dhoni cruise in the Maldives was excellent. The only complaint I have is that I could have spent two weeks on the boat instead of the 8 days. The cruise needs to be longer!