After a lazy day around the pool yesterday were I stayed under an umbrella and still managed to burn we met up with other members of the group and went to a fish restaurant for dinner. Kingsly our guide immediately purchased a bottle of coconut whisky, shared it out between us and left us to explore the menu for our selves. The huge prawns we had were so tasty and discovering the whiskey bottle empty we started on the local beer. By 9 o'clock local time we had drunk the restaurant dry and so retired to the hotel bar. I should point out that there were only six of our party present and so this was quite an achievement and this has probably set the tone for the next few weeks. After a hasty breakfast at 0730 we were joined by the last two to join our group of eight and set off for Negombo. We visited fish markets, churches, temples and a roofing tile factory. You would be hard pressed to get more diverse than that. We had a great couple of hours on the canals and rivers spotting kingfishers, heron, cormorant and monitor lizards. Lunch involved a few more beers and we have just finished off with a cooling swim in the pool at the hotel. We meet for dinner as a group at 8 after the obligatory drinks in the bar at 7.30. Wonderful! Keep safe Ruth and David