26/08/2026
Rickshaw Run - Sri Lanka 2024 / 2025
After a few days of beach and beers, we made our way to Rekawa beach for the meet and greet. Walking through the doors of the hotel we were excited to have a pool and beach right in front, after dropping our bags and checking in and sitting down for a beer, we were duly informed that we didn’t have a booking! Later we learnt that the owner decided to rent it out to a group and pretended we didn’t book 🤷♂️
After multiple phone calls, we managed to get a room a bit further out of town down a dirt road. You know when you get to a place and you think is this real? It was so random that it was good. The owners were an eccentric older European couple that planned to retire in Sri Lanka, the hotel was half finished (due to Covid), and a random group of guest!
After checking in, we headed off to the meet and greet, and chatted to a bunch of people that were excited to start. The next day we picked up the keys to our Rickshaw 🛺 for the next 7 days - number 27, we did some test driving and somehow managed to damage the side of the wheel flap.
That night was new years and I do like the fact we could be up close and personal with the fireworks. After celebrating with the Rickshaw run peeps, we ended up heading back to the hotel and joining the hotel guests on the beach for their New Year’s party. And boy did they have a story to tell, I wish we could have been there to experience it.
They had a dinner to welcome the new year with entertainment, and everything that could have gone wrong went wrong for them. The entertainment was the handyman dressing up and acting out random stories, and the fireworks they planned was a disaster. We talked about how we all ended up at the hotel for new years - one was American and did a high end surf trip and decided to stay here before going home, one came from Singapore with his son and wanted to stay because of the bad reviews on Google, and one was a family from Europe staying for a family holiday and us.
It was so random that it was good!
