Blogs from Colombo, Western Province, Sri Lanka, Asia - page 4

Up early, I went for a run and got a bit lost in the dead end one way street system which meant a supposed 6km became 8 so arrived back pretty tired and flustered. We'd ordered fish curry for breakfast which after a big meal of curry the night before no one really felt like. Anyway couldn't be changed but,frankly, it was a fabulous breakfast. Decided to have a look at the market so got a couple of tuktuks and had a wander around. Went to few more pharmacies on our quest to get replacement drugs for Donna and some antibiotics. All to no avail, it appears the specific drug required is not available in SL. Plenty of alternatives on offer though. Made our way to Barefoot shop which came highly recommended and had a garden ... read more

This is the map of our Sri Lanka and southern India Tour from 4 September to 6 October 2017. The travel includes 4 days in Colombo, the 13 Day Highlights of Sri Lanka tour and the 16 Day Kerala & the Southern Wonders tour with 3 additional days in Chennai.... read more

I had asked many other tourists about Colombo and it seemed like nobody had anything nice to say about the capital of Sri Lanka. Everything we had heard was negative. People had told us that traffic was insane, that the city was noisy and polluted. We had also heard that it could be dangerous… My parents were even wondering whether it was worth stopping there. I was curious about the city, and I could not visit Sri Lanka without spending at least a day in the capital. So we kept it for the end of our trip, so that we would already have our Sri Lankan feet, that is to say we’d hope to be more familiar with the traffic, the local customs, the price of things… Well, it turns out that Colombo is a much ... read more

HE SAID... After a comfortable flight from Singapore (just under four hours), we touched down at Bandaranaike International Airport at midnight. The airport is in Katunayake, which is 40 kilometres from Colombo. We had a reasonably quick transition through customs, although standing in a slow moving queue to get our passports checked and stamped was a little tedious in the humid midnight air. We made our way out of customs, found our pre-arranged transfer vehicle and sped off towards Colombo, arriving at our hotel (Taru Villas Lake Lodge) around 1:15am. A very tired hotel manager was waiting up for us, and after some preliminary paper work, he showed us to our room. The place was amazing, with heaps of room. We dropped our packs, showered and crashed at 2:30am. After just four hours’ sleep, we woke ... read more

Today we had a really lazy start. We were packing up as Don and I were going to Galle and Caroline was going back home to Manchester. Her flight was scheduled for the late evening. Jagath was paranoid about getting her to the airport early. For some reason best known only to the government, the airport was closed all during the day time (and this was the height of the tourist season) for alterations and only open overnight when all the flights and checkin activities were crowded together. We lazed around the hotel finishing the Boggle competition and chatting. Today was the only day we had any serious political conversation. I am pleased to say that we are all mature enough (at last) to appreciate the others' views. Caroline won the Boggle tournament. In fact her ... read more