The 25 Best New Trips for 2010 -
The National Geographic has ranked Sri Lanka Second in their list of Best New Trips for 2010 Now more than ever, travelers want their dollars to do more—for others, for the planet, for themselves. At least that's what we found while searching for the best trips of 2010. From wolf-tracking in Slovakia to rafting a forbidden river in Bhutan, here are 25 brand-new adventures, all of them just right for right now.
After the tsunami of 2004 and the resolutio
n of a decades-long civil war, Sri Lanka is finally starting to look like its old self: a peaceful destination where surf lineups are nonexistent despite world-class waves and centuries-old tea estates are lined with mountain bike–ready trails.“The silver lining of the civil war is that the land and wildlife have remained untouched,” says Lisa Bolger, trip coordinator for Access Trips, one of the very few outfitters leading excursions to the Indian Ocean island this coming year.
Access’s new itinerary combines surfing at Hikkaduwa (Sri Lanka’s answer to Costa Rica’s Tamarindo—minus the tourists), hiking 7,362-foot Adam’s Peak (considered sacred by four local religions), and mountain biking the same trails that tea farmers have been using since Sri Lanka first began producing the crop 250 years ago. At 25,000 square miles, the island lets you cover a lot in a short amount of time. “Within a half day we move between vastly different topographies, climates, and wildlife zones,” says Bolger. Rare is the place you see rice paddies from the back of an elephant in the morning and ocean views from a mountaintop by midday.
Outfitter: Access Trips; accesstrips.com
Price: $2,795 ($$)
Length: 10 days
Departs: February–April
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