Manor House Kandy

... il y en a dans toutes les rues, et specialement devant ce temple, car en 98 les Tigres Tamouls ont fait un attentat qui a detruit une partie du temple, mais qui, dans le meme temps, a fait decouvrir trois epaisseurs de fresques sur certains murs, bref ce militaire, me dit que je peux pas rentrer en shorts... Interloque, je fais demi tour et decide de ne pas revenir visiter ce temple, ca leur apprendra a etre tolerants! Marche le long du temple pour tenter de prendre des photos ...

... there were 2 tickets (altho&#8217; we were asked for the total amount as one ticket): one for 750 rupees for the sanctuary and one for 500 rupees for the river!!<br><br>I returned from Pinnewala to the lovely Peradeniya Botanical Gardens, with the heavens opening just after we&#8217;d entered. Cultured and developed since 1371, the gardens were properly formed in 1821 by the English and nurtured ever since. Occupying a long stretch of peninsula with the Mahaweli ...

... my guest house. I would like to think I taught him to swim.....but I'm pretty sure doggy paddling comes naturally.... Since my time in Sri Lanka was almost over I wanted to check out Colombo's night life. Nightlife does not really exists anywhere else in Sri Lanka because women are not aloud to mix at bars or clubs. Colombo is pretty much the only place this ...

... I had contacted my Swedish friend Inge again and I was lucky enough that I could sail with him from Langkawi to Penang, his first stage in sailing from Malaysia across the Pacific towards South America. Inge picked me up from the ferry jetty by dingy and as soon as we arrived at his yacht we prepared it for sailing and within an hour we were sailing towards Penang. I had never sailed before. The first bit out of the harbour we used the engine a bit as well but as soon as ...

... were clearly underpaid. Looking after these gentle giants day in, day out is a risky business and not an occupation I would ever choose to undertake but it was fun to be a fly on the wall for a few hours, despite being charged an outrageous amount to enter. Oh well, it's all for a good cause. I just hope the people in charge spend our foreign notes on the upkeep of the elephants and not on fattening their wallets. Am I being too cynical..?

... the lake collapsed and that appears to be some years ago. To make absolutely certain nobody, except the police can ever drive up the left hand side a long stretch has been included in the site of the temple of the tooth relic, the first religious site I've ever known which charges admission. As for the town bazaar, it's not up to the great markets of Africa and exudes a quite seedy air. The arts and crafts centre draws one in with a promise of working craftsman but in reality ...

... at some point walk through its doors was a welcome distraction from sleeping difficulties -- a very welcome taste of luxury though. Managed to find Marmite while strolling through Cargill's, the grand dame of Sri Lankas department stores and was accosted by family from Royston. I cant help but compare, and Sri Lanka certainly seems more laid back and friendlier than India -- or at least Northern India -- dispite the numbers of heavily armed soldiers everywhere -- its ...

the flight to sri lanka from dubai was pretty nice, for about 90 minutes they plied you with food and drink then after that we were flat out so it couldnt of gone better. at one point i had a glass of white wine, a mug of red and half of carlys carlsberg. the only down side was some schizo i was sat next to that liked to swing his elbows about and caught me int forehead wi one so i give him a 'f**kin c##t', knowin fine well he wudnt understand but it made me feel pretty hard ...

... Sri Lankan standards) and by 8am we had stopped for breakfast (more string hoppers and Lentil Dahl but sadly no boiled egg this time) then back in the van for the final hour. By now traffic had built up and the final few miles in Colombo were a noisy and bad tempered stop start affair. I had no idea what I expected the plans for the clinic complex to be but I was totally and utterly amazed when I saw the architects conceptual drawings. The complex has a veterinary clinic equipped ...

... was pretty cool, we hung out the windows and watched life go by as people went about their business, past rough shacks stacked together tightly using the train line as their front yard, through lush tropical vegetation with the Indian ocean spread out to our right washing up onto beautiful sandy coves in amongst the many coconut trees. I tried climbing on the roof, but was discouraged by some of the locals in our carriage. Maybe I'd have to wait for India to try that stunt. We ...