Grand Orient Hotel Colombo

... me an extra 100 Rupees (50p). I know it seems peanuts from the UK but you have to stand your ground because otherwise you would constantly get ripped off.<br><br>You have to constantly haggle and this is what happened again when I got to the station. I needed to get a Tuctuc to get to the hotel. The first guy I asked wanted 1,000 Rupees so I just walk off. Another guy who saw this happen came up to me and asked how the guy had asked me. I did not want to ...

... transport was in Havana for a cruise down the Malecon. Not quite such a sedate experience, Simon was initiated at hurtling speed into Colombo life. I don&#8217;t think the experience is so different to riding in an Istanbul taxi but as Simon pointed out, you&#8217;re more exposed in a tuc-tuc.<br><br>On Saturday we took a tuc-tuc tour around the tourist sites and did a little shopping &#8211 ...

... I got a room down the hall from Daisy and unpacked. About two hours after having done a Martha Stewart routine of sorting, organizing, re-packing and laying everything out, including defrosting the ice buildup in the mini-bar so I could use it, I decided to unpack some items in the bathroom. It was there that I noticed cigarette smoke coming through the bathroom vents. About an hour later I went downstairs to have a look around the hotel and stopped at ...

... ainda dura, mas ainda ha muita tensao e algumas areas no norte ainda estao sob controlo dos Tigres Tamil. Devido a isto, a seguranca e bastante alta e ha tropas por todo o lado, o centro e sul do pais e bastante seguro mas, quando em viagem, ainda encontramos postos de controlo por todo o lado e somos controlados e revistados varias vezes ao dia. Durante os seculos XVI e XVII os Portugueses controlaram a costa e o comercio no Sri Lanka, e deixaram a sua marca ...

... environs. Close to the peninsula enclosing the top of the lagoon lie the very modest remains of the old Dutch fort, mostly demolished to make way for the prison that still stands behind the gateway. Rather disconcertingly the prison stood open, and a couple of prisoners attended to chores just inside the grounds, leaving me hoping their crimes hadn't been borne out of a helpless desire to severely injure passing tourists! Continuing around the lagoon you're greeted ...

... so much better than yesterday Her leg is still very sore and she is not fully weight bearing but her condition is fantastic given how awful it could have been. Mango has also been at the temple since last year and was the dog I wrote about in my first blog that had mange, open wounds and was very close to death. It's tragic that both her Truffles got pregnant shortly before we had the neutering clinic booked last month. We will have then neutered as soon ...

Another day without electricity. Apparently the day long powercuts are on purpose. They are working on the generators. It wasn't too bad as I was outside most of the day, but the others felt the heat! There is still limited power and i'm expecting the computer to turn off at any time! Renalli and Rod arrived down at 630am this morning!! They decided to leave the house at 3am to miss the ...

... where a woman frisked me and looked in my fanny pack. She was tickled by my readers in the tiny red metal case. We went into the temple and looked at the various sacred places, which didn't feel very sacred to me. There were 20 or 30 people seated on the floor in front of the tooth, praying. Most were sitting up against a wall, 2 were kneeling with their foreheads on the ground. There are 3 times each day when there's a ceremony, when they ring a gong and ...