Day1- longest day..

The moment I arrive at Heathrow the planning and preparation was all behind me, nothing more I could do now but go! I had managed to get my bag down to just 12Kgs which is 5kgs lighter than I took to Spain for the 3 day Tomatina festival!

The Indians really have no sense of urgency and they do love to que up
For everything!
Only 2 checking desks were open which were processing passengers at a shockingly slow speed!

The 9 hour flight was good, despite being one of the most bumpy flights I have had! Jet airways has been surprisingly good... So far!

The new jet airways terminal had just opened that day so we were stuck on the taxi way for over an hour!
I sprinted to the transfers security area where I found that none of the machines had been installed yet so they frisked and inspected everyone's bags.

Not all of the signs had been out up so I managed to run to the wrong gate, (85C not 85D which turned out to be in another whole different terminal area... I was sure I had missed my flight. After realising my mistake and making it to the correct area I was surprised to find that I wasn't the only person who had been delayed, the bus door opened to let in what can only be described as the cast from the movie "marigold hotel" as a group of English OAPs arrived, Shouting at each other and moaning about both the heat and jet airways! They were on a tour of India and Sri Lanka.

We made it to the plane.. Amid some annoyed glances by the other passengers, by this point I was sweating so much from the running and the heat of the Indian night that my clothes stuck to me like glue, but it was still a welcome change from the stormy cold weather of England and Norway.
It was another good flight and I even managed to eat my boots BLT sandwich which had been in my bag for over 10 hours now... At least it aged well!

I landed in Sri Lanka at 4am but it was still busy. Everyone was really helpful and pointed me the right way but the "we believe in the death penalty for drug trafficking" signs everywhere is a little off putting!

I managed to get a cheap taxi ride in to town which took about 45 mins and was surprisingly well driven. Sri Lanka certainly seems to be much more organised than India!

I arrived at the hostel at about 4.45am the other backpackers were just going to bed!!