Geography

Sri Lanka is shaped like a teardrop falling from southern end of India. It’s just 353km long from north to south and only 183km at its widest. Its area of 66,000sqkm is about the same as that of Ireland or Tasmania, Australia.
The central hill country rises a little south of the centre of the island and is surrounded by a coastal plain. The flat north-central and northern plain extends from the hill country all the way to the northern tip of the island and this region is much drier than the rest of the island. The best beaches are on the south-west, south and east coast.
The highest mountain in the spectacularly beautiful hill country region is Pidurutalagla (2524m), which rises above Nuwara Eliya. Sri Pada (Adam’s Peak), at 2224m, is far better known and much more spectacular. The Mahaweli Ganga, Sri Lanka’s longest river , has its source close to Sri Pada and runs into the sea at Trincomalee. In the north-west of the country Mannar Island, joined to the mainland by bridge, is almost connected to Rameswaram in southern India by the long chain of sandbanks and islets called Adam’s Bridge.

Climate

Sri Lanka is a typically tropical country in that there are distinct dry and wet seasons, but the picture is somewhat complicated by the fact that it is subject to two monsoons. From May to August the south-west monsoon brings rain to the southern and western coastal regions and the central hill country. The season is called Yala. The dry season in these regions is from December to March. The north-east monsoon blows from October to January – the Maha season – bringing rain to the north and east of the island.
This peculiar monsoon pattern means that it is always the ‘right’ season somewhere on the island – thought that advantage has been undermined by the troubles in the east for much of the past few years. Don’t count on the weather following the rules though – it often seems to be raining where it should be sunny and sunny where it should be raining, and many other parts of the world Sri Lanka has suffered some unusual weather conditions in recent years, with a serious drought in 1992 and another in 1996.
In the low-lying coastal regions the temperature is uniformly high year round – Colombo averages 270C. The temperatures rapidly fall with altitude, so if you don’t feel like cooling off in the sea you have simply to go up into the hill country. At Kandy (altitude 450m) the average temperature is 200C and at Nuwara Eliya (at 1890m) you’re down to 160C. The climate is generally like an eternal spring up in the hills but you should come prepared for chilly evenings.
The highest temperatures are usually from March to June but the mercury rarely climbs above 350C. However the humidity, the humidity in these months routinely reaches 75%, and will make you feel a few degrees hotter than the recorded temperature. November to January is usually the coolest time of the year. The sea can be counted upon to remain at round 270C year round, although it is much less suitable for swimming during the monsoon period when it can be choppy and murky.
There is also an inter-monsoon period in October and November when rain and thunderstorms can occur in many parts of the island. The south, south-west and central highlands are much wetter than the northern and north-central regions. In the latter area annual rainfall averages only 100cm and the many tanks, built over 1000 years ago to provide irrigation water, indicate that this is by no means a new problem. In the wetter part of the country annual rainfall reaches 400cm or more.