Pulmoddai & Arisimalai

Do you need a one day trip suggestion? Are you interested to discover the very North of Trinco District?

Then you should head to Pulmoddai. The small town is situated a 90 minutes bus ride from Trincomalee Town, has one of the best beaches in the East and boasts one of the most important mineral mine, worldwide.

Start your walk in the town. Ask the friendly locals for the Arisimalai beach and they will either tell you directly or organize someone who can tell you where to go. In the streets you will find already fish laid out on brown blankets and boys on way too large bicycles.

Boy and Fish, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

Leave the main road and follow the Thakwa Street, all the way to the fishermen settlement.

Thakwa Street, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

The Muslim fishermen settled here in rather temporary huts. Since there is hardly any tourism in this region, everyone wants to chat with you. And of some you are even asked to take pictures of.

Muslim Fishermen settlement, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

Fisherman, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

Be ready for a challenge now. You have to cross the sea to get to the small peninsula with its famous beach. You have two options: Either you ask a fisherman to cross you with his boat, or, you might get wet, YOU cross it by yourself. It will be one meter deep, maximum. The bridge you might spot about a hundred meter further South is destroyed, which makes everyday life for the families on the peninsula a bit adventurous. Follow up a small path, passing a mini kiosk till you reach a Buddha statue. Turn left before and hand over your passport. Yes, from now on you will be escorted by soldiers, their guns around their neck, ready for whatever intervention. The path through the small jungle is beautiful. And once you reached the point where the thick shrubberies clear up, a magnificent yellow-sanded beach appears. 

Beginning of the Jungle Path, Mai 2013

Arisimalai Beach, Mai 2013

Thousands of dragonflies swirl around. The water is amazingly clear and there are geologically colorfully formed rocks that you can climb to watch crabs, fish and the soldiers who either search the sand to find nice gravels or observe your actions. Honestly, once at the beach I never felt totally comfortable in the presence of soldiers. It had something surreal for me. The now peaceful beach has a bloody past which you can be guessed only by (maybe LTTE) signs on stones which have been painted over and by the present soldiers.

After a bath in the crystal clear water, walk back to the fisherman settlement and be astonished by the noisy scene of tractors and dredges that remove the black sand right next to the fishermen.  

Dredge at work, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

Tractor at work, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

The Mine, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

The Lanka Mineral Mine Ltd., which is operating here in Pulmoddai since 1957, is working mainly at the same spot as the local fishermen. (More information about the mine). Walk through the fishermen settlement situated further West, say hello to the tractor drivers and then head back to Pulmoddai Town via the Thakwa Street. A colorful Mosque awaits you at the end of this walk.

Mosque, Pulmoddai, Mai 2013

Here comes the map:

View Pulmoddai in a larger map