Wednesday 4th December 2019

I slept in until 08:00 this morning, which was lovely! I then had a great breakfast of semolina with curried gravy, hoppers and some mango, washed down by 2 large cups of delicious Sri Lankan tea. Semolina with curried gravy doesn’t sound the most appetizing of breakfasts, but it was dry semolina, a bit like very fine couscous, and it was certainly very tasty!

I had to get a bit more money out, as I needed a little for my journey to Colombo, so JP kindly drove me into town. On the way I popped into the school to take a photo of the ‘Welcome’ banner I made for them, and I also got one last photo of all the staff there, including Ramesh, which was lovely, as I hadn’t been able to say goodbye to him yesterday.

Reggie picked me up at 14:00, as arranged and we set off on the long drive to the Airport - only about 180 kilometres away, but the roads are terrible, so you only average around 30 kilometres an hour. We had a little break early on at Ramboda Falls near Pussellawa, which seemed particularly powerful after all the recent rain (it was still raining hard when we got there) and then stopped for some food and a toilet break about halfway through the journey.

We got to Bandaranaike International Airport not long after 20:00, where there was very tight army checkpoint security before you were even allowed near the airport. In view of the traffic, I had allowed plenty of time, but we arrived so early that I wasn’t allowed to check in and had to wait for about 3 hours. The airport had free WiFi, so I was able to check emails and update my Daily Diary and my Blog, although the novelty wore off after a while and I was relieved when I eventually got through check in and security.

 Today's photos show the 'Welcome' banner I made for the school in Nuwara Eliya (a bit dark sadly), a final photo of the lovely group of staff there, a final shot of JP and Loga in their home, a beautiful view of Ramboda Falls and a final picture of Reggie with his car, the first person from Nuwara Eliya I met when he picked me up from Nanuoya Station in his tuk-tuk 3 months ago and the last person from Nuwara Eliya I saw before I flew home!










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