McLaren’s are flying again

2009 Formula 1 Season started with Brawn GP team winning most of the races in the first half in the season. The season had many rule changes. Especially people were discussing on the KERS. Though Hamilton was promoted to the 3rd place in the first race in the season he was disqualified from that couple of days after that. No KERS car won nor managed to get a podium finish till Massa finishing 3rd on Nürburgring in Germany on the 9th race in the season.

McLaren cars received a major upgrade just before the Nürburgring, and yes it was well reflected in the Practices and in the Qualifying. Though Hamilton finished last due to an unfortunate incident in the very first corner the McLaren cars showed that they are very powerful. Next came the Hungarian GP and McLarens were flying. Hamilton scored the Victory making the first ever KERS car victory in Formula 1 while his team mate Kovalainen taking 5th place.

Today, 22nd August 2009 I was watching the Qualifying of the European GP and McLarens did fly once again. The Pole position was taken by Hamilton while Kovalainen taking the 2nd place. Valencia Street Circuit is where KERS can play a big role, McLarens will charge the KERS battery in the practice lap and when the race starts they will be smoking the rest of the cars for sure :P This is only my prediction, let’s wait and see what happens tomorrow :)

Hikkaduwa Beach Festival 2009

The Hikkaduwa Beach festival started last year, and the Sri Lanka Tourism is conducting it as an annual event. The Hikkaduwa Beach Festival 2009 started on 30th July 2009 and continued for 4 days.

VIP Ticket

We planned the Hikka trip about a month ahead knowing booking a place to stay would be an issue if we wait till the end. I tried to book my usual place at Hikka but it was already booked by someone else. So we booked another place which happened to be on the land side. As soon as the tickets were out I managed to book 10 VIP tickets. Since I was the first to collect those tickets we got tickets starting from ticket number 00001 to 00010 (VVIP I guess)

Though the Hikka Fest started on Thursday, 30th July we went there only on Friday, 31st July. So we missed the entire Drum Festival. Friday we left Colombo around 11pm after having dinner. We arrived at Hikka just before the midnight. We chilled at the guest house till 1.30 am and went for the Beach Rave party at Imperial Hotel Stretch. The music was all techno and the place was crowded. There was a separate area for the people having VIP tickets but that area wasn’t much packed. Though we had VIP tickets we stayed most of the time in the general area.

Beach Rave

The Rave party went till the morning however we left the party around 4.30 am and slept will 10 or 11 am Saturday.

Saturday afternoon we went to see the beach carnival at Corel Gardens. There were few interesting sculptures made for the Sand Castle contest. We were also planning on doing a sand castle but we didn’t have much time to prepare and gave it up. At the other side of the beach near Corel Sands hotel things were prepared for the beach games.

An attractive sculpture

The Beach Carnival area

We came back to the guest house and rested till 9pm. Then we went to the Roti Shop and had dinner before going for Theme parties at Narigama beach stretch. There were 3 separate DJs going on at that location. The beach stretch was not big as where the Rave party held but this time it was totally packed with the young crowd from Colombo.

Theme parties

Since we started partying early on Saturday we came back to take some rest little early as well. Sunday everyone got up late just like the Saturday, again everyone missed breakfast but had a good brunch. I wanted to stay Sunday night at Hikka as well but others wanted to go back to Colombo since they needed some rest. We all went to the beach where the beach carnival took place and headed back towards Colombo.

Our final moments at Hikka

Link(s): Hikka Fest