How to travel Sri Lanka during covid-19
Tags: Travel Writing, Sri Lanka, Travel, Covid Diaries, Travel Tips

How to travel Sri Lanka during covid-19

There are still countries that you can travel to. Of course, always under specified templates and rules. The entry requirements as well as the rules in the country itself depend on the respective situation with Covid-19 and can therefore change from one day to the next. Staying up to date is a bit of a challenge. But it’s definitely worthwhile to keep checking back and finding out what the situation is like in other countries. That’s how we finally ended up in Sri Lanka.

What do you need for a trip to Sri Lanka?

Currently, if you want to enter Sri Lanka, you don’t need much at all. At least compared to many other countries such as Thailand. However, it also makes a big difference whether you are already fully vaccinated or want to enter as an unvaccinated person.

For entry as a vaccinated person you need the following:

Passport

Visa (ETA) for Sri Lanka (apply online beforehand)

Negative official Corona test with QR code (NO self or rapid test)

Hotel booking of a Level 1 Safe & Secure Hotel for one night (we booked the Fairway Colombo)

Booking of a PCR test in Sri Lanka (usually included in the hotel booking).

Fully completed Health Declaration (document can be easily downloaded).

Onward flight from Sri Lanka

International vaccination certificate in English (usually the vaccination certificate is international and also in English)

The required documents, such as the negative PCR test, the hotel booking and the visa (ETA) should be printed out beforehand, as they are only valid in this form. A proof via smartphone or digitally is unfortunately not recognized.

If you do not print and fill out the Health Declaration in advance, it is not a problem. You will receive this document again on the flight to Sri Lanka and if needed also again at the airport before you officially enter the country.

Our trip to Sri Lanka starts at the airport in Dubai

After we had done a PCR test the day before our departure — which was negative — we had all the documents printed out at the hotel in the morning before our flight. We had done some research online beforehand, so we knew that we would need to present some of the documents in printed form.

Our flight from Dubai to Sri Lanka leaves in the evening at 11:25 pm and takes about 4.5 hours. Since we already had to check out of the hotel at 3pm, we spent the rest of the afternoon until the evening in the Dubai Mall. So the time went by quite fast. Around 9 pm we took a cab to the airport.

Once there, I was initially very shocked at how many people are here with suitcases. I have not seen so many travelers for a long time. Due to the pandemic, travel is much more difficult and thus the airports were always very empty and partially extinct. I suspect that more people travel in Dubai, because 90% are already vaccinated. But I am not sure.

At the entrance to the check-in area was a real crowd. We were asked by security where we were traveling and then waved through the people. A very long line of travelers formed directly behind the barrier, already beyond the designated areas. Fortunately for us, they were all in line for a flight to Canada.

The check-in

There was hardly anything going on at the check-in for the flight to Sri Lanka. Only ahead of us at the counter itself were other travelers, so we were able to check ourselves in very quickly. We gave the employee at the counter all our documents (passport, PCR test, hotel booking, health declaration) and thought that we had submitted everything we needed. At first it seemed as if everything was in order, but then the employee called in a colleague.

We were immediately worried that we didn’t have all the documents after all, since the preparation for our trip seemed so “simple” to us. We were told that we had to have the PCR test in duplicate. But this would not be a problem, because we could have it copied at the airport itself. So far so good.

However, there was another problem. Since we plan to extend our visa in Sri Lanka and stay longer than 30 days, we have not yet booked an onward flight. Besides, we don’t know yet where we will go next. We assumed that this is a requirement that exists but is not relevant. When you enter Thailand, an onward flight is also officially required, but in practice they don’t ask for it. Here, however, it is.

But we were lucky again. The two employees explained to us that we should simply pick an onward flight or return flight to Dubai and click through the booking process until we know the exact flight details (such as times, flight number and airline). Before we pay for the flight, we are simply supposed to take screenshots of the booking details and show them. If we are asked about the onward flight at immigration (which is probably very unlikely), we should say that we are already in the booking process and then show the screenshots. That way there should be no problems with immigration.

Another option would be to book a flight that you can cancel again afterwards for free. It is just a matter of knowing the flight details and being able to communicate them. To avoid unnecessary costs for a flight you don’t take, there are these two options. The staff was very friendly and helpful and patiently worked with us to pick out a flight and help us with any questions.

When Marc finally went to copy the PCR tests, I chatted a bit with the two staff members. I learned that one of the employees would like to travel to Germany to visit friends there, but that she was denied entry because she does not have a vaccination that is recognized in Germany. She now wants to be vaccinated again with a recognized vaccine in order to be able to travel to Germany.

It is crazy how different countries deal with the entry requirements and especially with the recognized vaccinations. You would think that every Covid-19 vaccination would protect. And if they do, they should be recognized worldwide and there should be no differences between countries and vaccines. But that’s a whole other topic :-D

The flight from Dubai to Sri Lanka

Now that we had all the necessary documents, nothing stood in the way of our trip. After the check-in we bought something to drink and slowly walked to our gate. Once there, it didn’t take long until boarding began.

Before we were allowed to board the plane, all hand luggage — no matter if it was a small backpack, a bag or a small suitcase — was weighed again. We could observe that some of the travelers probably had too heavy luggage and probably had to pay extra for it at a counter.

We went to boarding relatively towards the end. Shortly before the weight control we were addressed by another traveler whether we could take a bag from him. This was probably filled with chocolate and he had probably too much weight. Since we ourselves were not sure whether our backpacks with the notebooks, cameras, etc. could not also be too heavy, we told him that we could not take his things. But he didn’t let up until finally a staff member explained that it was not allowed to take other people’s stuff. We were then waved through without a weight check and finally let onto the plane by the two check-in staff.

The plane to Sri Lanka itself was very empty. We were both even more surprised when all passengers (about 60 people) were placed only in the back of the plane. The two nice employees had given us extra seats in the “first” row, so we had plenty of legroom. We were also very happy about that.

In general, the plane was unfortunately not very modern. The backrests between the seats could not be folded down and also the screens left a lot to be desired. Normally, you can watch many different movies or even series on the screens on such a flight. Here, however, there was no such function and also the flight display did not work.

Shortly after departure, we were then directly served a meal. For me there was a vegetarian lasagna, potato salad and some fruit. Marc had rice with chicken and also the potato salad with fruit as dessert. Also, slips of paper with the Health Declaration were distributed for those who still needed it. Afterwards the lights were dimmed and a few hours later we landed in Sri Lanka.

The arrival in Sri Lanka

After landing, we walked down a narrow corridor and finally up an escalator into a large room. On the right side there are tables and employees in protective clothing. They hand out the Health Declaration, in case you didn’t fill it out in the plane.

On the left, there are 4 small booths, two of which have employees (also in protective clothing). Two queues form automatically. Footprints on the floor once again indicate the distance. The employees check the Health Declaration, the vaccination certificate (i.e. our vaccination cards) and again the PCR test. Afterwards we get back one side of the Health Declaration with a corresponding stamp on it and are allowed to go on to the actual immigration.

There is no queue and we can go directly to an employee. He checks our passport again, asks us to pull down the mask to see our faces and that’s it. Stamp purely and we are officially in Sri Lanka entered. No further controls or anything else.

More employees wave you into a duty free store. Since there seems to be no other way we walk along there and get to the baggage carousels. There we quickly get our suitcases and we have done everything important. Again, there is only one way to go, past a scanner for the luggage. There we are waved through without any further control and finally greeted by our driver — also completely in protective clothing — with a name tag.

He leads us past armed soldiers to his car. It is meanwhile approx. 5 o’clock in the morning and the sun has already risen. The air is still quite cool, but we notice that it will soon be warm. We get into the car and the driver takes us to our hotel. On the way there, we keep seeing heavily armed military on the streets. We suspect that the because of the lockdown currently so strongly control and are present. This was imposed on 20.08.2021 and lasts until 31.08.2021. We hope that it will be relaxed again somewhat afterwards.