Bentota

I have been to Bentota Beach Hotel couple of time during the last year alone, it’s a nice place. But most importantly their food is the best. I and few people I know initiated this trip and we all were ready for this, we booked the hotel 3 days in advance, but that’s the only thing we had to plan for. We decided to use Train to travel so arranging van burden was completely eliminated. Plus it’s very cheap :D

Saturday (27th June 2009) we went to the Fort railway station to get the train. The train was supposed to arrive at 1.30 pm but when it arrived it was passed 2.00 pm. The traveling didn’t take much time, by 3.00 pm we were at Bentota. The Bentota railway station is just walking distance to the Bentota Beach Hotel. We checked in to the hotel and chilled out for a while and soon we went to the pool. The pool wasn’t much crowded because the weather wasn’t that good. After that we went to the beach for a moment and went back to our rooms to rest for a while. Finally it was the time I was waiting for... the Buffet :). I’m quite sure the others who went with me were shocked of seeing me eating all that food. I mean you should eat all you can while you can right?? Plus we have paid for that. I only stopped eating because the others were done with the dinner, otherwise I would have gone for another round :D

After the dinner we rested for some time and went to the dance floor near the pub around 10.30 pm. The DJ was not very good and the music was kinda boring but I must say the crowd rocked the dance floor. We stayed there about 2-3 hours and went to bed and got up a little late in the next day morning. Went to the breakfast again had a super meal and went for a swim in the pool. At the hotel there was a separate pool to play water polo so we used that pool as well. After doing all that we went for lunch and took the bus back to Colombo.

Bentota Beach Hotel - View 1

Bentota Beach Hotel - View 2

Bentota Beach Hotel - View 3

Bentota Beach Hotel - View 4

Ground Zero

To start off I must admit that I’m not a big fan of computer games. I have played some computer games but that’s it, I have never played a multiplayer game with anyone else.

I went to see few old friends of mine on Friday (12th June 2009) just to see how they are doing. Well they were alright and they asked me to come play some computer games with them, well I couldn’t say 'No' and since I haven't done anything like that before I said Ok. Prakanthan called and booked this place called 'Ground Zero', I didn’t even know what it was or where it was. It happened to be at the 'Excel World'. There were 7 of us and I asked Prakanthan what computer game that we are going to play, and he said it’s 'Halo 3'. I have seen Nuvina playing Halo on his computer so I figured it was some first person shooting game. But at Ground Zero it was X-Box and there weren't any computer key boards. They had these devices just for the games.

The next thing I knew the game was on, and I was like 'OMG what to do now' but somehow I figured and Damn... it was fun. Glad they do it like everyday but honestly it’s a waste of money plus it’s not what I used to do on Friday nights just not my thing. Having said that I’m not gonna say that I didn’t enjoy it, of course I did enjoy it a lot :)

Car showrooms in Thailand

In the shopping malls in Sri Lanka we don’t see cars for sale, the most precious car showroom in Sri Lanka in the Porsche showroom at Peliyagoda. But I saw all these cars in a shopping mall at Bangkok.

Ferrari - Front View

Ferrari - Front View

Ferrari - Side View

Lotus

Porsche

Lamborghini

Lamborghini

Lamborghini Podium

White color Lamborghini - Front View

Lamborghini - Side View

Lamborghini - Front View

Dinner Cruise

On my second day at Thailand (3rd June 2009), while we were going on this city tour, the tour guide asked whether we are interested on going to Dream World and some Nature Park and a Dinner Cruise. I personally liked the Dream World as it involves lot of games we don’t see in Sri Lanka. But the problem was it takes the whole day and unfortunately for me my sister didn’t like since she wanted to do more and more shopping. The next option was the Nature Park (an open Zoo or something) again the time was the problem. So we were left with the only option which was also the most expensive of all 3, the “Dinner Cruise”.

My first guess was it’s not worth the price, but seriously it’s totally worth for that price. On 4th June 2009 we were taken to this place where we have to get in the boat. At that point only I realized a grand dinner on a big boat size of a super Yacht with all the singing and is just perfect for anyone. For me it’s my first experience like that. The rivers in Thailand are wide enough for a big boat to travel, there were many as 20 big boats like in one section of the river alone. We got onboard the boat and went to our table on the upper deck. Soon the boat started to move along the river and the singers started to sing. The view by the river is just wonderful; there were many hotels and other skyscrapers built near the river. The upper deck had an open area so we could see the beauty of Bangkok from there.

The Boat

The Buffet

Dining tables on the boat

Buffet of the another Boat

The Buffet

The Singer

The 2 hours I spent on that boat was amazing, if we had something similar in Colombo it would be another attraction point for the tourists.

Thailand Tour

Thailand is a country where you can spend a quality holiday for a cheap price. I was planning this tour for quite some time. I saw couple of promotional emails going here and there and I and couple of my friends initiated a plan, A Tour in Thailand. A 10 day (or more) tour which covers most parts in Thailand and do many different activities. Well all that planning and it didn’t work for some reason. For a moment I thought I wouldn’t be able to go to Thailand this year but guess what a miracle happened, my mother has also seen the same promotional vouchers and she asked me whether I know anything about it.

So it happened, no friends just family. We booked the tickets and got visa about 2 weeks before the tour. The duration was set to just 5 days and since my mother and sister wanted to do more shopping it would just be Bangkok :(

We left Sri Lanka on 2nd June 2009, and at the Air port we saw the Sri Lanka Air Force Kfir and F-7 Jets taking off for rehearsals of the Victory Day. It was a wonderful view as I have never seen a military jet taking off. We boarded the plane and landed safely in Bangkok after 3 and half hours. The flight was almost empty and I watched couple of old movies during the flight. After we were cleared from the air port we were taken to the hotel which we booked, the First Hotel in Bangkok isn’t the best nor the worst. The First Hotel is located close to most of the shopping malls so it is very convenient.

Colombo Air Port

View from the Plane

First day we arrived at night, so there isn’t much to do, just have dinner at Burger King and went to bed. The next day morning we had some good breakfast from the hotel and the tour guide was supposed to pick us up but they informed us that they’ll be late so we went shopping. Basically we went to see where the malls are located so we could have some idea of Bangkok.

View from the Plane - Bangkok at night

Burger King - Bangkok

After the tour guide arrived we went on the City Tour which was included in the package. First they took us to two temples, which I don’t know why they took us there. Anyhow the temples were different to what we see in Sri Lanka, but there were some thing in common. There were temples every inch in Thailand just like in Sri Lanka for some wired reason.

The next highlight of the City Tour was the Gem Museum, first I thought it was some boring place but I was wrong. It was one super place; loads of jewelry and stuff were there to see. We weren’t allowed to take pictures of this place due to security reasons :(

There are lot more highlights in the 5 day tour to Thailand, so it’ll be posting them separately. Overall the country, people and specially the food is excellent :)

Shopping Malls at Bangkok

Roads and the 'Sky Train' at Bangkok