In a few Facebook groups related to travel in Sri Lanka, one person asked : “What is best province for travelling in srilanka?? Tell us ……”

This is a difficult question. Here is my attempt to answer it though.

I believe it all depends upon what you look for.

If you are interested in sustainable tourism, here is a photo showing 3 tourism companies acknowledged as sustainability champions during a ceremony held in Colombo on 13th of June 2023 by SLTA (Sri Lanka Tourism Alliance).

SLTA has awarded 20 tourism businesses the sustainability champion title, based on hundreds of applications in the country.

Sri Lanka has 9 provinces, 25 districts.

Out of the 20 champions, 3 (posing happily on the photo) are from Batticaloa district.

Yes… You read it well… 3 are from this unknown district that many people in Colombo are not even able to locate on a Sri Lankan map.

Because there was a civil war till 2009 in Sri Lanka, the North and East have been difficult of access during decades, while other parts of the country were building hotels.

So somehow, Nature has been preserved by the fighting.

The war is over since 2009.

But still, travellers are rare in the North and East.

Let’s come back to our maths lesson of the day…

1 district out of 25, so 1/25=4%

3 awardees out of 20… so 3/20=15%…

15/4=3.75… which means that if you look at the national level, Batticaloa sustainable tourism businesses are 3.75 times more represented than they should be if amongst the awardees, all districts would have an equal number of awardees.

The war preserved us from hasty development ONLY to a certain extent.

Yes, Batticaloa district also has some nonsensical buildings and tourism businesses harming the environment.

A damned lot needs to be done in terms of educating the whole society about environmental protection, preservation of local cultures, mutual understanding, etc.

Out of all the applicants who work with sustainable principles at heart in Sri Lanka, 3 tourism businesses in our district, who took the challenge to be on this path, despite the consequences of the war, the poverty, the insecurity that was prevailing earlier in our war affected district, have been awarded a sustainability champion certificate.

On 13th of June 2023, SLTA awarded 20 sustainable companies, and I personally felt that after years of hard work and commitment of our whole team to work in the district, whatever the challenges, receiving this award along much better established businesses who do fantastic work in other parts of the country, was proving that reconciliation was possible.

A common vision is on its way.

Sri Lanka,

4 main religions,

3 languages,

1 smile.

Feeling grateful with Sri Lanka Tourism Alliance , Karpaha Sands and Riviera Resort Sri Lanka

Sending Peace and Love to all amazing Sri Lankan Sisters and Brothers from Beautiful Batticaloa.

We see a lot of posts on social media of travellers wanting to help Sri Lankan people.

Though it usually comes from a good intention, what travellers propose to do is probably not always the best they could do. .

Let’s not speak here about the people whose intention is unhappily to make a buzz on instagram by posting pix of them distributing pencils to poor-looking children, as i do hope they are not the majority of the travellers who say they want to help.

Nevertheless, a lot of posts by people willing to help are about bringing used clothes or stationary from their home countries to distribute to people in need here.

Is it really what is most needed here?

If you really want to help, it could be useful to think about reciprocity.

Imagine you would face an economic crisis in your own country, where employment becomes scarce, inflation is so high that at some point, even though you had been considered as a middle-class family, you also can’t afford the basics anymore… Now, some foreign travellers visit your country and see your distress. What would make more sense here? That they bring you used clothes from their country? That they give stationary they brought from home to your kids?

In reality, sorry to say so, but none of these gestures significantly helps the local economy. And I am sure a majority of you would agree that if you were made jobless by an economic crisis, you would prefer to be employed for a day, so that you could provide for your family, rather than to receive pencils for your kids. Especially if the electricity company just reminded you that without payment of your bill within a week, they would disconnect the electricity supply.

So Sri Lanka is not different. If you really mean to help, please when you come, kindly try your best to create local employment. There are indeed so many ways to do so, here are just a few suggestions:

Take a local guide when you go trekking rather than relying on Google maps.

Buy from street vendors and small shops.

Hire a local taxi when moving from place to place (not through a damn cheap app please, which is known for not paying fairly the drivers).

Eat in local restaurants rather than cooking yourself.

Stitch new clothes by buying local fabrics and hiring a local tailor to copy your favorite dress.

Drink plenty of coconut juices on the road side.

Take a guided tour, an excursion where you get to learn from the local people.

Hire the expertise of a local travel agent rather than spending countless hours on social media to create your itinerary.

Buy local handicraft and souvenirs to gift your loved ones.

Tip the people who help you on the way.

Etc. Etc…

These are only a few ways to generate work and income for the local population, and to make a real difference, in terms of economic recovery.

No offense here, but please consider that as a struggling country with an ailing tourism industry, what we need from you is more work than charity.

Please assist the friendly Sri Lankan people by kindly giving them many many many possibilities to assist you in filling your holidays with some meaningful sharing and caring opportunities.

Thanks to our guests to have understood this so well! Here enjoying our “when nature lovers meet” excursion and preparing soil in Rûmi’s Eco Garden during their visit of Batticaloa.

To prepare yourselves for your trip to Sri Lanka, here is a detailed description of the steps necessary to take out the compulsory COVID insurance… and some tips as a bonus!

So… you are about to travel to Sri Lanka, and the steps you have to take before arriving in our little paradise island seem overwhelming to you? No panic needed here, we’re there to make it easy for you… follow the guide!

There are some compulsory steps to take to be able to travel to Sri Lanka, they will be the subject of another post. Today, let’s focus on one of them, the compulsory local Covid insurance.

1- What is it?

It is a local insurance, managed by a Sri Lankan insurance company, called People’s Insurance, which you currently have to subscribe to when travelling to Sri Lanka. It used to be compulsory when Sri Lanka reopened its borders, then it became optional, but it has been compulsory again since January 1, 2022 for all travellers, including children, regardless of their vaccination status.

It costs 12 USD per person for 30 days, and is valid from the moment you enter Sri Lankan territory. It is renewable for 6 USD per month for people staying more than 30 days in Sri Lanka.

2- How to subscribe?

At present time, it is subscribed online, by a procedure that has become very simple. You do not need your travel dates or your flight number, you are not asked for your age, or your address… The only information you will need to indicate in the subscription form is as follows:

• First name :
• Last name :
• E-mail address :
• Passport number :
• Nationality (choose from a drop-down list):

After completing this and clicking on the “Proceed to payment” button, you are directed to a summary page which allows you to check that you have not made a mistake when entering the requested data.

If you made a mistake, you can go back to the previous page and correct it. Otherwise, click the “Proceed to payment” button again. You are then directed to a classic payment page, where you can choose payment by credit card or payment by “Unionpay SecurePay” (seems to be a Chinese site).

If you click on payment by credit card, you will be asked for the card number, the expiry date, the name of the card owner, and the security code (the 3 digits on the back of the card).

The amount to be paid is indicated at the bottom of the page, then when you click on “Pay Now”, depending on your credit card device, you may be asked for an OTP (one-time password), sent to your mobile phone or by email for verification of the transaction.

Enter the password received in the box provided for this purpose, validate, and if all goes well, you should land on a “Payment successful” screen, with a reference number that I advise you to write down.

You will then receive the insurance policy by email, in your name, with the description in English of all the guarantees covered. The time needed to receive this certificate may vary depending on the workload of the insurance employees, for our travelers for whom I made the request day-time on a weekday, one hour was enough to receive the confirmation.

So you see, when it works, it’s not more difficult than that!

I nevertheless invite you to consult the paragraph below on tips, because even though Sri Lanka is a little piece of paradise, there could be bugs in the computer systems…

3- What does this compulsory insurance cover?

First of all, it is a covid insurance, therefore it does not cover other travel-related risks, so think about subscribing a travel, cancellation, illness/accident, etc. insurance. as usual.

It covers the person declared positive for Covid during their stay in Sri Lanka, with a total maximum liability of 50,000 USD, and maximum costs covered for each type of service.

For example, if you were to be isolated in a hotel room after testing positive, the maximum reimbursement you could claim is LKR 15,000 per day, for a maximum of 21 days.

It is therefore necessary to read carefully in the policy document sent by the insurance,

– The details of the services covered and the maximum amount covered for each service

– The conditions of application (for example, being able to prove your negative PCR status within 72 hours of leaving the country of origin, providing proof of expenses incurred, etc.)

– The procedure to follow in the event of a positive PCR test in Sri Lanka (immediately inform the insurance company, be able to prove the contamination, etc.)

Beware that in the event of a positive test, you will have to advance all the costs, and you will only have, according to the insurance policy, 21 days after your contamination (date of your positive PCR test) to provide the necessary documentation to get refunded.

4- Is this insurance sufficient?

If you want to be reimbursed in full for the costs incurred in the event of Covid positivity, I would say that no, it is not sufficient.

The compulsory insurance does not necessarily cover all the costs incurred.

Let’s go back to our example of if you were to be isolated in a hotel room after testing positive, the maximum reimbursement you could claim is LKR 15,000 per day, for a maximum of 21 days. However, the daily price of the quarantine hotel can be much higher… sky is the limit…

So I strongly advise you to add to this compulsory insurance, a personal covid insurance subscribed in your country of origin, while checking carefully that Sri Lanka is one of the countries covered… because it could happen, since Sri Lanka has this compulsory insurance, that other insurances do not reimburse covid related costs in Sri Lanka.

5- What is the validity period of the compulsory Covid insurance?

The insurance is valid for 30 days from your arrival in Sri Lanka, and is renewable for 6 USD per month for people staying more than 30 days in Sri Lanka.

6- A few tips to save time and your peace of mind

To save time, before starting the subscription, it is necessary that you have at hand:

– your passport (you will be asked for its number),

– your credit card for payment

– your telephone or email box available if your payments by credit card require the entry of an OTP (one-time password) sent either by sms or by email depending on the bank.

Although Sri Lanka welcomes you with open arms, not everything is perfect, and online procedures sometimes take longer than expected, with servers that can abandon you along the way, unexpected error messages, interrupted connections… In short… here is my advice to stay zen:

– First, before starting your steps, make yourself a warm cup of Sri Lankan tea, that is to say a Ceylon tea, black, strong enough, with a good dose of milk and – at least – 3 spoons of sugar (we are starting to prepare for the trip on this side too 😊)…

– Second, provide your information without special characters. Forget accents, cedillas, the server does not recognize them and puts question marks instead. You can indicate your surname and first name in capitals if that seems more appropriate to you or if Françoise’s little c feels very shy without her cedilla.

– Third, double check that you have not made a mistake before proceeding to payment. In particular for the email, this is how your insurance policy will be sent to you, so if your email contains an error, you will not receive it.

– Finally, and this is probably the most important advice, to avoid worries in case the server decides to take a tea break along the way and you fail, despite several attempts, to subscribe to the insurance online, take screenshots of all the steps. A special little paragraph seems needed on this particular piece of advice.

7- Focus on screenshots

For having read many many messages on social networks from future travelers panicking during the preparation of their trip, helpless when dealing with a server that does not work, an impossible payment, etc. I advise you to proceed likewise for all the necessary procedures (ETA, Covid Insurance, health declaration, etc.)

– Preferably do your online procedures on a computer. This will increase the quality of screenshots for possible needed printing.

– Before starting an online process, open a word file on your computer so that you can paste all your screenshots easily.

– Start filling out the documents online, and before each page validation, which will take you to the next page, take a screenshot and copy and paste it into your word file.

– If you find yourself stuck at a step along the way, try again, perseverance and patience usually pay off.

– If your payment does not work, try with another credit card if possible, or change browser.

– If after several attempts, you are unable to complete the procedure and/or you do not ultimately receive the certificate proving that you are insured, print the screenshots before going to the airport, so that you can show the check-in staff this proof that you have tried and failed in the process.

Generally speaking, I would advise you to print all your travel documents. And this while we are an environmentally friendly travel agency and therefore wish to limit the printing of documents as much as possible… but in exceptional circumstances, we sometimes need exceptional measures.

Indeed, given the complexity of traveling in times of covid, you have to put the odds on your side to avoid the risk of being refused boarding.

Imagine for example that your smartphone, which has certainly already proven its wicked sense of humor to you in critical moments, does not work when it is time to present the digital proof of your vaccinations, insurance, etc. Here you are in super stress to try to convince the ground staff that you have taken the necessary steps to visit Sri Lanka. Be for sure prepared for a conflict with an employee who must check that you have all the necessary documents and is not able to register without them.

In short, put the odds on your side to prepare for this beautiful trip…

So print your documents, and if that makes you feel guilty, come and see us in Batticaloa, we have plenty of seeds to be planted to compensate for the use of paper lost in these steps 😉

8- In conclusion…

Do not hesitate to revisit this page where we will publish other information from time to time to prepare you for the trip.

Well… if you are ready now, I suggest you start the process. Below is the link to take out your covid insurance, one of the keys opening the door of a wonderful country, for a trip that we wish will be magnificent and full of beautiful encounters and discoveries.

Welcome to Sri Lanka!

Don’t forget the cup of milk tea with plenty, oh sorry…too much! of sugar before starting…

Insurance is here! https://portal.pionline.lk/covidinsurance/

See you soon in Sri Lanka! Please feel free to reach out for help in preparing your trip…

Sandrine Debruyne

Sandrine Debruyne is French, has lived in Sri Lanka since 2009 and created in 2013 with 2 Sri Lankan friends the travel agency “East N’ West on Board”, a small “boutique” agency, specializing in the creation of tailor-made trips, off the beaten track, respectful of nature and communities, aiming at meeting locals.

Apart from trips all around Sri Lanka, the agency also organizes in Batticaloa, on the East Coast of Sri Lanka where it is based, excursions by bicycle or tuktuk, to give travellers the opportunity to spend time with local families, eager to share their knowledge and cultures, while receiving an additional income. Homestays and camping experiences in rural areas complete the agency’s immersive offer, for tours that give preference to slowness, sweetness of life, meaning and people over speed and ticked bucket lists, to the delight of its travellers.