Brief Encounters | What to do in Galle, Sri Lanka – a laid-back long weekend destination
- From crumbling colonial architecture to local fare like hoppers and sambal, the city on the southwest of India’s tear has much to offer visitors
- Explore beyond the famous fort’s walls and go whale watching in nearby Mirissa
Galle draws its zeitgeist from its seaside fort, whose coral-and-granite walls encircle many of the best hotels, shops, sights and eateries. No bureaucratic busybody has thought to besmirch its ramparts with health-and-safety railings, vegetable hawkers squawk their way about the streets, children’s poetry recitations waft beyond school walls: this isn’t some preserved-in-aspic – cliché alert – historical gem, but a living, breathing community.
Pick somewhere to stay among the neat grid of streets, step out of the front door each morning and the whole of the fort lies waiting – a one-stop experiential travel shop that’s grown up more or less of its own accord.
Where to stay
Where to shop
Happy the visitor with a morning to spare, a hankering to peruse and a modest wad of rupees. Sprinkled here and there about the fort, seemingly more by accident than design, a score of ateliers display their wares with an attitude that tends more to museum than mall.