Monday 16th January 2023

Today was one of those delightful 'Sri Lankan' days that could really try your patience of you haven't learned to 'go with the flow'. Having our plans to return to Blackpool thwarted yesterday afternoon by a rather strange request to go all the way to Maskeliya, just to pick up a cake, things took a further twist today, when the first baking of this cake didn't go well, so we were delayed for a great deal of time waiting for the second one to be ready.

We didn't get to Maskeliya until gone 12:00 in the end, having also needed to pick up a cake box for this precious cake on the way. The problem then was that we had to somehow transport this very special cake all the way home to Blackpool, which was no mean feat, as they tend to slide around in the box. It was certainly clear that if we covered any of the journey on a government bus, it would be 'mission failed' and the cake would be a mess!

So we took a tuk-tuk from Maskeliya all the way to Hatton, and I phoned Donald, whose father, Anton, is a tuk-tuk driver, to ask him to pick us up in Hatton and take us on the rest of the journey to Blackpool. Fortunately, he was available, and we arrived back in Blackpool around 16:00, well before dark. More importantly, the precious cake had only slipped a little bit on its board and still looked more than presentable! Only in Sri Lanka eh!

The weekend had been extremely hot (it was idyllic on the sports field), but we did get a bit chilly on the way back to Blackpool in the tuk-tuk - indeed I had to lend Anton one of my jackets for the journey back to Hatton (knowing it will get returned to me at some point9. Over the course of the day, I developed a nasty head cold and sore throat, and by the time I went to bed I was feeling pretty lousy, so I wasn't sure what the morning would bring!

Today's photos are, as promised, a continuation of the ones that you have already had for the weekend, as today was decidedly uneventful, albeit amusing, and there was nothing much to photograph on the journey.













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