Ahila's travel highlights

I stayed at Ariyawan Rest, after nearly three years. The rooms had undergone a fresh coat of lilac paint, instead of the pink it used to wear. The exterior also had shed its pink coat and donned a dark-yellow. As far as I am aware, there is only this place to stay at in Ampara for visitors passing through on short visits. I checked in around 6p.m., having pre-booked. I heard that the management had changed hands and indeed, the current people seemed more enthusiastic. A badminton court had been set up in the courtyard in the middle and the staff played enthusiastically. I was very much tempted to join in, except that I was already too tired and had to get up early the next morning. So, opted instead to have an early dinner and sleep.

Around 6a.m., we started our drive back to Colombo, stopping for an early breakfast of stringhoppers, coconut sambol and ginger tea at a roadside 'kade' near Parakramabahu Road.

Ampara is at its most beautiful in the months of December and January. All the green from the rains is very pleasing to the eyes. We took the route passing through Bibile and Kandy, which had a very scenic route past lakes and mountains. Serendipity would best describe that route. Puppies and kittens seemed perfectly content at lying on the middle of the road, sleeping or playing and birds were loath to fly away from the road they had alighted upon. I worried that we would end up hitting one of them but our driver skilfully managed to steer the vehicle away from them.

The drive from Ampara to Kandy, though nearly 200kms, took us only three hours but the remaining route from Kandy to Colombo, which was less than 150 Kms took us more than four hours because of the heavy traffic.