Taxi in Bentota, private transfers at a fixed price

We collect from any hotel, villa or guesthouse in Bentota, Aluthgama, Induruwa and Beruwala, at the entrance rather than at a road junction. The large resorts along the beach road all have proper porticos and our drivers use them. If you are staying in a small villa on the river side, give us the landmark rather than the postal address: house numbering on the lanes behind the beach is genuinely unreliable, and a named guesthouse is found faster than a number.

The expressway exit is at Welipenna, about fifteen minutes inland, and that detail matters more than it sounds: a driver who knows to use the E01 rather than the old coastal Galle Road saves you well over an hour on the run from the airport. Bentota also has a railway station on the coastal line, which is charming and slow, and impossible with more than a rucksack. Within the resort strip itself everything is walkable or a five-minute tuk-tuk ride. For anything beyond — Galle, Hikkaduwa, the Madu river — a car with a driver is the only arrangement that does not eat half your day.

Bentota swims well from November to April, which is the dry season on this coast. From May to September the south-west monsoon puts a strong shore break on the beach and the river becomes the better option. The resort strip is quiet in the evening by design; if you want restaurants and bars within walking distance, Hikkaduwa an hour south is a different proposition entirely. Bentota is also the most practical first or last night on the island for anyone with a difficult flight time, because it is close enough to the airport to be reached without a pre-dawn start.

The Madu Ganga boat trip is the thing to do here and it is better than its reputation suggests: mangrove tunnels, cinnamon smallholdings, and a monastery on an island. Go early, before the convoy of larger boats. The Brief Garden, twenty minutes inland, was Bevis Bawa's home and is quieter and stranger than his brother Geoffrey's far more famous Lunuganga nearby; both are worth an afternoon. The turtle hatcheries along the coast road vary enormously in seriousness, so ask before you pay.