The Jaffna Peninsula ends at a series of causeways and ferry points where the land dissolves into the Palk Strait in a chain of flat coral islands stretching westward toward India. Most travellers who reach Jaffna spend their time in the city, visiting the fort and the kovils and the library and eating the crab curry that the peninsula is justifiably famous for, and then turn back south without crossing to the islands. That is understandable. The islands require a different kind of effort, the ferry schedules and the flat, windswept crossings and the absence of tourist infrastructure asking more of you than a well-organised city visit. But what they give in return is the far northern edge of Sri Lanka at its most elemental, a landscape of open sea and coral scrub and ancient devotion that has no equivalent anywhere else on the island.
Five days through the Jaffna Archipelago, from the sacred island of Nainativu to the wind-scoured wilderness of Delft, covers the part of Sri Lanka that sits furthest from the tourist economy and closest to the sea.
Day 1 — Arriving in Jaffna
Jaffna is the entry point for the archipelago and worth a full first day on its own terms. The city has been rebuilding its cultural and commercial life since the end of the civil war with a energy that is visible in the restored library, the reopened restaurants, and the kovil festivals that fill the streets with colour and noise on the right evenings.
Arrive in the afternoon and go directly to the Nallur Kandaswamy Kovil, the most important Hindu temple in Sri Lanka, for the evening puja. The ceremony, conducted with drums and fire and a density of devotion that fills the surrounding streets, is one of the finest religious experiences on the island and sets the tone for a journey that will be, throughout, shaped by the particular character of Tamil Hindu sacred culture in the north.
For dinner, Cosy Restaurant on Hospital Road serves the Jaffna crab curry that the city’s reputation is built on. Order in advance if possible as the crab runs out on busy evenings. The preparation here, with the distinctive Jaffna spice blend that is heavier on pepper and lighter on coconut than the southern versions, is the benchmark against which every other crab curry in Sri Lanka should be measured.
For accommodation, Jetwing Jaffna is the most comfortable mid-range option in the city, well-positioned for the kovil and the market. For a more local experience, the family-run guesthouses along Racca Road offer clean rooms at budget prices with home-cooked Tamil breakfasts that are worth waking early for.
Day 2 — The Jaffna Market and the Causeway Islands
Spend the morning in the Jaffna Market, one of the most varied and lively in Sri Lanka. The dried fish section carries varieties specific to the northern waters. The palmyra palm products, from the sweet toddy to the dried fruit to the woven baskets made from the fronds, occupy an entire section of the covered market and reflect a palm culture that has no equivalent in the south. The Jaffna Public Library nearby, rebuilt after its destruction in 1981 and restored to something close to its original form, is worth an hour of quiet attention before the ferry crossings begin.
The causeway road west from Jaffna passes through Kayts and Karainagar, two islands connected to the mainland by causeways built during the colonial period. The flat, windswept landscape of these outer islands, the coconut palms leaning in the sea wind and the lagoon visible on both sides of the road, is the first indication of the character of the archipelago proper. Stop at the Dutch Fort at Hammenhiel, a small coral-block fortification sitting on a tiny island in the Kayts channel, accessible by a short boat ride and offering a concentrated piece of colonial military history in a setting of considerable isolation.
For lunch on Kayts island, the small lagoon-side restaurants near the Kayts jetty serve a fresh fish curry and rice for around three hundred and fifty rupees that reflects the immediate proximity of the surrounding water in the quality of the ingredient.
Day 3 — Nainativu and the Nagapooshani Amman Temple
The ferry to Nainativu departs from the Kurikadduwan jetty on Punkudutivu island, reached by causeway from the Jaffna mainland. The crossing takes about thirty minutes through the shallow, turquoise waters of the Palk Strait, the island appearing gradually as a low green line on the water ahead. Nainativu is a small island of about a square kilometre, its entire existence organised around the two sacred sites that sit at either end of it.
The Nagapooshani Amman Temple at the northern end is one of the most significant Hindu sacred sites in Sri Lanka, its principal deity the goddess Bhagavathi, believed to grant fertility and fulfil the wishes of devoted pilgrims. The temple draws devotees from across Sri Lanka and southern India throughout the year, the ferry service running continuously on festival days when the demand exceeds the capacity of any reasonable timetable. The gopuram of the temple, visible from the approaching ferry and rising above the low island vegetation with an authority entirely out of proportion to the island’s size, is one of the more affecting arrival images in Sri Lanka.
The Buddhist Nagadipa Vihara at the southern end marks the site believed to be where the Buddha made his second visit to Sri Lanka, and the contrast between the two sacred sites at either end of this small island, the Hindu temple busy with pilgrims and the Buddhist vihara quiet and contemplative, captures something essential about the religious geography of the northern Sri Lanka that no amount of description can fully replace.
Return to the mainland by the last afternoon ferry and eat dinner in Jaffna. Rio Ice Cream on Hospital Road, a Jaffna institution that has been serving the city’s population since the 1960s, is the correct place to end a day on the water. The palmyra fruit ice cream is specific to Jaffna and available nowhere else in Sri Lanka.
Day 4 — Delft: The Wild Island
The ferry to Delft departs from Kurikadduwan in the early morning and the crossing takes about an hour through open water. Delft is the furthest island in the Jaffna Archipelago and the most remote in character, a flat, wind-scoured piece of coral and scrub about five kilometres across with a population of a few hundred fishing families and a herd of wild ponies descended from horses brought by the Dutch in the 17th century.
The ponies roam the island freely, grazing on whatever the scrub provides and regarding the occasional visitor with the mild indifference of animals that have never been managed. Encountering a small herd of them on the coral road that crosses the island, the sea visible on both sides and the wind constant and the landscape utterly flat in every direction, is one of those travel experiences that stays in the memory as something genuinely unlike anything else.
The Portuguese fort ruins at the eastern end of the island are modest in scale but considerable in atmosphere, the coral-block walls sitting above the sea with a presence that the centuries of wind and salt have worn to something more honest than careful preservation could achieve. The giant’s tank, a Portuguese-era water cistern cut from a single coral rock, sits nearby and is still used by the island community for water storage.
The ferry back to the mainland departs in the late afternoon and the crossing in the evening light, with the island receding behind the boat and the Jaffna Peninsula appearing ahead, is a quietly satisfying close to the furthest day of the journey.
Day 5 — The Return Through the Peninsula
Use the final morning for the parts of Jaffna that the first day did not reach. The Jaffna Fort, built by the Portuguese in 1618 and expanded by the Dutch, is one of the largest and best-preserved colonial fortifications in Sri Lanka. The star-shaped earthwork design is best appreciated from the air or a map, but the scale of the walls and the views across the lagoon from the ramparts are sufficient reason to spend two hours inside.
The Kantharmadam area east of the fort contains some of the finest traditional Tamil architecture remaining in Jaffna, the old merchant houses with their carved wooden facades and their enclosed courtyards reflecting a domestic architectural tradition that the war damaged significantly but did not entirely eliminate. Walking these streets in the late morning, when the light comes through the compound trees and the houses are going about their daily business, is the most immediate encounter with the pre-war Jaffna that the city still offers.
For a farewell lunch before the drive south, Mangos Restaurant near the Nallur Kovil serves a good rice and curry with a Jaffna-style mutton preparation that the kitchen takes seriously. The drive back to Colombo from Jaffna takes around six hours on the A9 highway, the northern landscape giving way gradually to the dry zone interior and then the cultural triangle before the expressway absorbs the final stretch into the city.
Practical Notes
The ferry to Nainativu runs from Kurikadduwan daily from around six in the morning with departures approximately every hour. The Delft ferry runs twice daily in each direction and the schedule should be confirmed the day before at the jetty. Both islands require a full day each and cannot be combined. The best time for the archipelago is between January and April when the sea conditions are calmest and the ferry crossings most reliable. Carry cash throughout as there are no ATM facilities on any of the islands.
