Sri Lanka - The Beginning!

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Hello all! My plan is to try and keep this brief and not too much of a ramble...if it turns into that then I apologise in advance and don't blame you for not keeping up to date with it!

So after a pretty hectic last two months we finally set off to Sri Lanka to begin our adventure but before I get into the travelling bit there are a few people I want to say thank you to first! First of all thank you to all of you that we've bored to tears over the last couple of years talking about our plans which probably never seemed like they were going to materialise...but they have so enjoy work whilst we don't have to for a year!!! Thanks to Andy, Danni, Izzy and Skye for a great week in France and thank you to Antje, Jörg, Jenny and Jesco for a great week in Germany before we left (Jesco we're yet to find a dance floor here let alone one that spins!). Thank you to everyone at the cricket club who hosted our leaving party and for the very generous card and collection. A big thank you to everyone that came to the party, even though I was paralytic and asleep by 9pm it was a great night and we were both amazed as to how many people came along! Thank you to Kate and Danny for getting married / hosting a second leaving party for us in Ilfracombe/ giving me a reason to stay in the UK longer and getting made redundant / lending me a bag to travel with!!! Whebo and Pelley for driving us to the airport. Chris Gordon because I know he'll be reading this thinking he should have been mentioned a lot sooner than this already for driving us to the wedding! And of course Mum and Dad for putting us up for the last couple of months...I hope it wasn't too bad for you guys it certainly wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be...although I think bringing Julia back after a night out rather than Bruce armed with pizza might have something to do with that! Sorry, rambling already!!!

Sri Lanka so far has been great, as good if not better than I remembered from 2007. For me it's been good to see how the country has changed in ten years, for example the one platform train station in Kandy has now grown into four platforms, a big station building and toilets for foreigners which would have been handy in 2007 when I walked in on a poor guy squatting over a hole in the floor.

We started the cricket tour, sorry trip...with the Sri Lanka v India T20 in Colombo we were sat with the home fans and were soon joining in with the dancing along to the band that kept going the whole time the game was going on (Julia at one point even let her guard down and admitted she was enjoying the cricket!) before heading north to Dambulla for 3 nights. From there we headed to Sigirya to climb Lion's Rock to enjoy the views and Pollonuwara where we hired bikes and looked at some ruins and spotted elephants.

We headed to Kandy from there for a night before getting the 6 hour train to Ella. 6 hours on a train sounds horrific but as train journeys go this is up there with the best with amazing views of valleys, tea plantations and waterfalls you get to see along the way! Ella has a really nice vibe to it. It's only small but is probably the most laid back place we've been to so far and has the most bars! We've successfully managed not to piss all our money up the wall yet and I have a feeling Julia won't be ordering a round of Arrack shots (the local spirit made from coconut and sugar cane) again too soon after last night!

We've met a few nice couples that we are going to head down south to the beaches with and our only concerns so far have been where to go for dinner and how we keep our alcohol tolerance to an optimum level for when The Perham's meet us in Bangkok in November - if anyone has any tips then do feel free to share!

I think that's enough for now, I hope everyone's well - stay in touch!

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Photos

T20 Sri Lanka v India
Indian team warming up

Dinner
Julia enjoying a pot of tea and dinner!

Train
View from train journey from Kandy to Ella