Negombo Fish Market

Most of the travelers skip Negombo or Colombo and go directly in the island to explore Kandy or Sigiriya. However, if you have the time, Negombo is the perfect place to recover from your flight and get your first experience with locals.

Every day fishers are getting out in their orwas (outrigger canoes) to get fish from the ocean. And Negombo is famous for this fish. This fish is not only coming from the ocean, there is a lagoon in Negombo which contains loads of prawns, lobster and crabs.

If you are able to make the fish market at 6 am in the morning you will have an amazing experience. There are bigger boats coming and also smaller boats. They bring a variety of fish to the market and auctions.

As usual those fish markets are chaos. You will have the locals that want to buy the best fish for the right price. Fishermen who are carrying out large tuna’s and other fish around the area to the right places. Sales people who will sell all those fish. It is one big messy orchestra that ends at 8 am, but even at 7 am most of the chaos and fish is gone, so make sure you arrive early.

It is fascinating to see how serious sales people are with their shop. They make sure everything is organized in a very symmetric matter.

Don’t forget also to go in a corner near the boats and see how some of the fish gets cleaned. This is not the place for vegetarians or people that hate fish smell. But if you. Are neither than you will have a fantastic time on this market by just looking around and having a chat with local people about their fish.

To see this market in live action, don’t forget to check out my vlog about the Negombo fish market. This will capture maybe more of the chaos than the pictures that I have just showed you and my story.

I am always up to explore fish markets. Before I went to the Tuna fish auction in Tokyo and lately I have visited the fish market in London at Billingsgate. If you guys have any amazing (fish) markets I need to visit in this world, please let me know.