Wednesday 23rd November - Colombo, Sri Lanka

When you've been awake thirty odd hours straight, you'd think a twelve hour nap would be easy.  Not so! Both Peter and I woke a little after midnight and it took me a little while to settle again.  A fitful night really, but we did sleep most of the night, until the alarm went off at 7 this morning.

So, a leisurely breakfast in the Bistro, where many of the staff recognised us and welcomed us back with big smiles, (they are a lovely crew on this ship).  We'd decided to go for a walk through Colombo this morning.  I have to admit, the city did look a little intimidating.  It had taken the bus almost 10 minutes to drive through the port area to bring us here and we didn't know how long it would take to walk out.  Colombo port is one of the biggest in the area and a very busy commercial dock.

The area looks pretty rough and squalid too and I planned to stay close to Peter. However, the little walk we planned didn't go quite the way we expected.

It turned out that it does take quite a long time to get out of the port, but it wasn't obvious at first.  We walked out of a gate a few minutes after getting off the ship and thought that was it.  Nope!  A good 10 minutes later, when we walked up some stairs to get off the road the into the city, we were asked to show our cruise cards again.

First impressions of the city is that it's big, busy, and like all cities, full of "helpful" characters who are really only looking for tips.  We'd decided to head towards the lake in the centre of the city, and then perhaps make our way to visit one of the Budhist Temples, and we followed our little Voyager issued paper map accordingly.  The first thing that caught my eye were the bats.  They were really quite big.  I'll have to work out what type they are later.

Indian flying fox bats, also known as giant fruit bats.  There were loads hanging in the trees of the noisy busy city centre.  Amazing really. 

Moving on, we were crossing the road, and one of the locals said good morning and commented about the heat and the sun and the fact that I was trying to cover up a little to avoid burning.  He started talk more, and explained he was from Candi (somewhere in middle of Sri Lanka I think), and worked as a lawyer in a bank.  He asked where we were from, how had we travelled, how long were we in Sri Lanka etc etc, explaing the best place to buy stuff, and that mostly the Sri Lankans, as Budhists, were helpful and wouldn't try to cheat you.  He seemed amazed that we didn't know that we'd arrived during a major holy and commercial event in Sri Lanka, and didn't know that Sri Lanka was the one of the best places in the world to get gemstones.  Not from the small shops in the city or near the port, because they would charge too much - but we should go to this place he knew, and that there was a 50% discount due to the holiday and that I could get a birth stone for nearly nothing and so on and so on.  Before we knew it he had hailed down a tuk tuk, agreed a price of $1 to get us there, and pushed us in.

A little bemused by what had just happened and the fact we had just agreed to visit this place - Peter and I sat in the back of the tuk tuk and thought about where we were going.  We decided we'd enjoy the ride and get the tuk tuk driver to turn round as soon as we got there.  But then I thought I'd have just have a very quick look.  You never know, if the gems where as cheap as the guy had said, we  may just pick up a little momento of our visit to Sri Lanka and this particular cruise.

One blue topaz later,(if you say "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges), Peter and I were in the back of a car driven by one of the employees.  He'd been tasked to take us to the ship and take payment for the stone on my visa card. (I'm still wondering if the guy on the street was plant?) Chamith (the employee driving us around) was then going to give us a lift back into town - to one of the Budhist Temples there.

But Chamith couldn't be more helpful. He decided he would take us on little tour as we drove towards the temple, and started pointing out various buildings, such as the presidential palace,

The Presidential Palace.  The current president has decided to live somewhere smaller and saved his people several million rupees.  The Sri Lankans are very happy about that.

museums and such, even stopping so that we could take photographs.  When we got to the temple, we said thank you, we'll walk back from here, but he seemed worried about us, saying that it would take an hour to walk back.  So he came into the temple with us, showing us the different rooms and then explaining different things.

Galboda Gnanissara Thera, The lead monk at the Gangaramaya Temple.  He became a monk at seven and is now well into his seventies and is very much revered.

The temple is now a bustling complex including a library and a museum as well as a massive and bemusing collection of gifts, trinkets and donations. 

The much loved elephant Ganga lived his life in the temple.  His remains have been preserved in memorial.

One of the smaller buildings in the temple complex housed this amazing image of the Budha.  The photo can't show the WOW factor of the place.  You'll have to visit. 

The temple is the largest and most important in the city, and busloads of people from the surrounding rural areas come to visit, pray and recieve blessings.  Chamith showed us the how to "water the tree" to worship, and then arranged for us to recieve the blessings from the monk. (We were the only passengers from the ship that recieved the blessings, so now we feel quite honoured.)

The monk who gave us the blessings- sruprisingly, he spoke English and explained the process .  He also got a torch out and highlighted the Budha's in the foreground, explaining that there was something like 24kg of ruby stone between them.

Chamith then drove us to the Memorial of Independence (from the British in 1948),

Colombo Independence Memorial.

and when he found out that Peter was an artist, he took us to see some the work of the locals.  I have to say, if you are in the city, and you feel that you'd like something special, then the paintings here are really quite brilliant.  If it wasn't for the fact that I'd already been talked into spending so much money, I could easily have bought one of these instead.  You have to go to the street behind the national museum, if only to look.  Those paintings were awesome.

Chamith seemed happy to keep us out for longer and wanted to take us somewhere for lunch, but we needed to get back to the ship. Because he'd been so nice, I ended up giving him $10 dollars at the end of the journey (partly to cover his "tip" to the guards at the port gates).  I think that would be nearly a days pay to him.

We decided that we'd stay on board in the afternoon, as the heat was exhausting.  In the evening we met the lecturers and the other crafter, and even later still, Peter had to stand and do his little intro piece as part of the Welcome Show to the passengers. We ended the day on the front deck talking to one of the lecturers until well gone midnight.  When we finally got to bed, we both agreed (gullible shopper moment notwithstanding), it had been a wonderful day.

We get to do our own thing tomorrow in Galle (pronounced gorl), so we can have a lie in in the morning.  Wonderful, just wonderful.