Day 14 - Friday 1st February

There was an option tour early this morning to go bird watching in the Anawilundawa wetlands. Our initial plan was to skip it and sleep in because our flight home leaves just after midnight tonight. But when Neil told us he had organised for us to keep our rooms all day, we decided to go on the tour.

The plan was to leave on the bus at 6:15am and so we set our alarms for 5:30am. Unfortunately, the bus was 20 minutes late getting to the hotel because of mechanical problems. It seems that the door wasn't working properly and had to be operated manually.

It was about 20 minutes to the wetlands. All the way to and from the wetlands, there was a constant beeping sound - no doubt, an alarm indicating the door fault. Also, the air conditioning only worked part of the time. Neil said there was another battery problem.

Despite the problems and the early start, it was well worth it. We walked along the edge of the reservoir for more than half an hour admiring the bird life and the scenery. The sun had risen soon after we left the hotel providing the ideal light for our outing.

We were back at the hotel by 8:30am and soon after went to breakfast in the hotel restaurant. After getting two fried eggs cooked by the chef, I noticed a tray of eggs benedict and so I had three eggs for breakfast - a first for me. I'm not looking forward to stepping onto the bathroom scales at home on Sunday morning.

Suzy sat by the pool to read her book on her iPad and later on the balcony outside our room. Before noon, many of our group were participating in an exercise class in the pool.

For lunch we decided to go back to the terrace outside the bar. Soon after we'd ordered our food and drinks, most of the others arrived.

By this time, the wind had picked up and there were plenty of white caps on the ocean. I went for a walk along the beach to see if there was any activity with the fishing boats. There were no people there - just birds enjoying flying in the breeze.

We had a rest and a nap back in our room so we'd be better prepared for the long flight home tonight.

Neil had asked us all to meet at the pool at 5pm. He gave a speech apologising for any mistakes and things that had gone wrong. He gave us feedback forms.

The driver and assistant were supposed to be there too but it was about 5:15pm before they arrived. Apparently, the bus had been parked in. They gave each of us a small gift consisting of Ceylonese tea. Next there was opportunity to take photos of the group with various cameras.

The bus was due to leave at 7pm and we had to have our bags outside the room by 6:30pm. The timing went OK because the bus had been fixed during the day. As we were packing our bags, we had our last opportunity to watch the sunset from our balcony.

Neil had promised that we would get to the airport by 9pm and we made it in time with a minute or two to spare. I think he must have told the driver about his promised deadline because it was a wild ride through the streets between Chillaw and Colombo.

I would have preferred a more leisurely drive and to arrive half an hour later because we had plenty of time. It is a credit to the driver that we arrived in one piece after so many near misses. He was driving much faster than Australian bus drivers would go and he was taking many more risks.

At the airport we were met by another guide who showed us into the airport terminal and explained how the system worked. We assumed he was provided by the travel agent. If so, it was impressive.

Colombo airport is chaotic and disorganised. There are crowds and long queues everywhere. I've probably seen worse but not many. Maybe Zimbabwe was worse. It made Sydney airport look good.

Eventually one of our group spotted a sign for Singapore Airlines in one corner of the terminal building. So we joined that queue and waited about 30 minutes for the check-in desks to open.

It was slow going - partly because there were very few counters open and partly because several people in front took ages.

It was about 10:30pm by the time we had gone through all stages of the checkin, security and passport control. Surprisingly the upstairs level was spacious, modern, clean and well lit. Time to sit down in a cafe and have a coffee and a sandwich followed by a walk to the boarding gate where we went through security and passport checks again.

We were lucky with the local SIM that we had bought for our mini WiFi on the night we arrived in Sri Lanka. We'd used it regularly throughout our holiday but it had a 50GB data limit. Tonight I was getting messages from Mobitel saying that there was only a few MB left. By the time we boarded the plane, we'd used all but 10MB.

Singapore Airlines are efficient in the way they board their flights because they call people out by group numbers. The plane pulled away from the terminal five minutes early.