Colombo

After six wonderful days in the Maldives, we landed back in Colombo on Sunday (September 10th, 2023). Since we skipped the city last time, we decided to stay here for two nights. Since we arrived late on Sunday evening, we only used Monday to see Colombo. We visited the merchant district of Pettah. There was a lot of activity here. Shop after shop is lined up throughout the district and there is a large market. It was very exciting to see how every little area was used to sell goods. The streets are arranged thematically according to the goods on offer. In addition to this district, Colombo has some historic buildings to offer. Compared to other Asian cities, Colombo still has a lot of preserved buildings from the last centuries. The reason for this is the almost 25-year civil war. As a result, there was not enough money to demolish these buildings and after the war the locals became aware of the value of the buildings.

Our conclusion about Colombo: the city has hardly any sights and you hardly miss anything if you don't visit it, but we already knew that in advance.

The next morning we got up at 4:15am to catch the train to Trincomalee. We found out more about this at the train station the day before. At the information desk we were told that the train was passing through and that we would arrive at our destination around 3:30 p.m.

The train left the station at 6 a.m. sharp. We met two other travelers on the platform. We exchanged travel experiences with them. At around 2:30 p.m. we noticed that the train had recently started going in the wrong direction. Since there was no conductor in sight, we asked other travelers whether we were on the right train. It turned out they were locals telling us we were on the wrong train. They explained to us that the train was not going to Trincomalee and we had to change trains. Our mood fell to its absolute lowest point. On the advice of the locals, we decided to get off at the next big station, which was another hour's drive away - we didn't have any other option. Here we were - somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Since we had already been on the road for over nine hours, we decided against the bus, which would have taken over three hours to get to Trincomalee. We took a taxi for 34 euros to get to our accommodation for 2 1/2 hours. After 13 hours our odyssey finally came to an end.

We really deserve the coming days on the beach.