Habarana, Sri Lanka

Ugh…another crack of dawn departure! It’s a 3 airplane trek today to get us to Sri Lanka. After breakfast, we transferred 2 miles to the airport for our one hour, 20-minute charter flight to Yangon. We’ve found a liquor store in the Yangon airport and Jim has stocked up on Makers Mark Bourbon for him and Hatim for their cigar outings in the evenings. Upon arrival, we board our private plane for our flight to Colombo, Sri Lanka’s colorful capital. We’re ready to be back home on our plane again. However, not so happy with our new seat assignments. Our original switch seats had to be changed for some reason. Now, other than Hatim and Durriya we’re surrounded by a bunch of dud passengers (especially Joan Proudfoot, who’s a *****y single on the trip and she’s right across the aisle from us) and we’re over the wing so no decent photos from the plane window. Worst of all, we lost our fabulous flight attendants Kate and Lana who are in the front cabin. My wine and champagne glasses were always filled with them in charge. Flight time 3 hours, 35 minutes. We have lunch on board. (Columbo is 1 hour behind Yangon) After clearing customs, unfortunately we were in the half of the group that had to wait for flights to Dambulla. They took us away from the airport on buses for a 35 min commute to a tea room. We walked down a mud puddle filled path to have hot tea outside on an un-air-conditioned patio. Not my idea of fun! Then we took the buses back to the airport again and went through customs and immigration screening THREE more friggin times! Finally at 4:45pm we get put on a small 8 seater plane for the 50 minute flight to Dambulla. And, as luck would have it, I’m on the sunny side of the plane and am getting fried by the sunlight. Then we had to get on yet another bus for a 30 minute drive to the hotel. I am not in the best of moods by now! Finally landed at the Dambulla airport. There was a cricket match going on right by the landing strip! Greeted at the hotel by a festive welcome, but by then I wasn’t even appreciative. I just wanted air conditioning and a drink. The hotel is lovely. Is is a minimalist, contemporary hotel designed by Sri Lanka’s famous architect, Geoffrey Bawa who conceived it as an “austere jungle palace.” It is a serpentine structure that clings to a hillside and is covered in jungle foliage. Great lengths were taken to safeguard the delicate ecosystem and environment upon which the hotel sits. The hotel has a sophisticated recycling plant. Dinner was supposed to be on the rooftop outside. Bad idea. Bugs were so bad people couldn’t put food in their mouth without getting a pile of bugs. Thankfully, we arrived just as the staff was scurrying to move everything inside. Huge buffet spread and, finally, some chocolate desserts. The food is fabulous! Heritance Kandalama Hotel 1 US Dollar=145 Sri Lanka Rupee Facts about Sri Lanka: Means honorable or resplendent island Population of 22 million Majority of people are Sinhala Buddhists Size of West Virginia Very low unemployment Their major industry is rubber