On Tuesday we left at 06.00. This seemed like overkill but Lionel told us that the traffic through Kandy would be awful and we had to get to the other side to catch our train into the tea country. He wasn’t wrong! About 4km outside of the city, we ground to a halt and just crawled and crawled. It took over an hour from this point to get to the city centre and longer to get to the station of Perendiya where we were to catch the 08.40 train. The journey took...

Today is National Day. It is a public holiday. What always happens on a bank holiday? It rains, right? This day is no exception! It rained in the night, it rained this morning and, although it stopped at about 1.30, if I’m honest, the outlook is not great! On the bright side, however, it is quite warm. Instead of a long walk around the estate we decided to take a short walk to the golf club. However, this was very quiet - perhaps unsurprisingly - and the...

Sunday. A late start 10.00. A drive to Kandy which is set on the steep sides of a valley. An 18C king decided a lake would be good so he had one built. Sadly Adrian had now been dead for many centuries so a new lake builder was employed! And then to the Temple of the Tooth. This is where one of Buddha’s teeth is kept and worshipped! You enter a very crowded temple (previously a royal palace) and pass the place where the alleged tooth is allegedly kept. I...

I’ve had trouble with this entry! I always have trouble with one and, apparently, this is it. I have now written and saved this blog three times - and lost it three times - so unless I get bored you’re going to have to do without it! Over and out!

Right! On Friday afternoon I tried to open the safe but three attempts later it had locked itself for 15 minutes. Quarter of an hour later, I tried again - three errors and locked out again - unnecessary as I was a.ready locked out! Despite my dear wife insinuating that I had put the wrong number in or had otherwise done something stupid, I called reception and they said someone would come over. ‘Someone’ it turned out was a team of 3 - duty manager, secur...