Articles from this Category
4 May 2003
Visiting Polonnaruwa The air-con had iced-up overnight and stopped cooling. That was our priority before leaving on our excursions this morning. We organised a room change after a breakfast of eggs any style, fruit, toast, jam and coffee/tea. Today we visit Polonnaruwa, the second most ancient kingdom after their invasion of the prior kingdom of […]
3 May 2003
Setting off Our hotel at Negombo beach, near Colombo’s airport, included a buffet breakfast. It was a small spread of food which included a potato curry and a chicken curry. We took a look at Negombo Beach, made use of the hotel pool before getting picked up at 1000. Shortly after starting our […]
3 May 2003
Above: Negombo beach from our hotel near the airport. Flying to Colombo We boarded the Emirates B777-200 bound for Colombo at 0030. The flight had originated in Jakarta. It wasn’t as full as I had expected so we had some spare seats. The delicious rendang meal was served on a full-sized tray with sides by […]
2 May 2003
Killing a day Due to the time difference, I woke at 0430 but dozed till 0630, and then till around 0800. We have the day to kill in the city-state until our flight after midnight tonight. Jess, my step-bro’s girlfriend dropped us off in the city. We priced some electronics at Sim Lim Square and […]
6 November 2002
I managed to sleep for 3h on the flight in the centre block of seats near the end of the cabin Kim on the other hand had two seats on the side and didn’t sleep as much. We landed in Auckland late in the morning to be picked up by Kim’s mum upon arrival. We […]
5 November 2002
We took the Star Ferry to meet Kim’s friend Chris for yum cha breakfast. He took us to a tall-ish round building with a revolving restaurant at the top. While the restaurant we went to wasn’t in the top revolving portion, it still offered a spectacular view up at about level 60. They did very […]
4 November 2002
After arriving at Hong Kong’s international airport, we found the train to the city. At the city end of the ride, we had to transfer to connecting shuttle buses (included in the fare) to the Park Hotel. [Edit: in later years, we decided that the public bus is actually faster than the train if one […]
3 November 2002
Today we have the last of our tours from Chiang Mai. After breakfast, we waited over an hour for our tour pick-up. The van arrived rather late around 0900 due to heavy rain, flooding, detours and traffic jam. The tour for the day is called Elephants at Work. When we got to the […]
2 November 2002
After another marvellous but early hotel breakfast we were picked up for our day tour to the Golden Triangle after 0700. In the vehicle were a group of Canadians (mainly family) who turned out to be great companions. We left Chiang Mai for Chiang Rai stopping at Chiang Saen, the capital of the old Lanna […]
1 November 2002
Relaxing I love Thailand and Malaysia when it comes to the buffet breakfasts at the hotels. Today was no exception at Imperial Mae Ping’s coffee shop. It was the usual East-West spread of congee, kwayteow, eggs, pastries, fruit etc. It was a busy place as there wasn’t a table in sight when we entered but […]