Okay, I won't spend much time on this, I'm afraid, but I will say that Sri Lanka was amazing, absolutely amazing. I would put it on a fairly short list of really great places I have been in the world. The people there are so friendly and kind, the country is small enough that you can actually see quite a bit of it in a short time (even though the roads and buses are pretty poor), and what you get for what you spend is very good value. It is almost a mix of India and Thailand. It's great (except for the food, which we'll politely call repetitive).This is roughly our route, missing all the little wobbles of the road in the hills (which take ages to get through, even though the buses go at break-neck speeds around hairpin turns). While the distance doens't look much (it appears to be only about 300 km North to South) it took ages to get anywhere, but what you got to see en-route was good and it was amazing to be at the beach, then 5 hrs later be in the hills, and the next day be in the arid North, surrounded by temples.
I'm not doing it justice by glossing over everything, but it was fabulous.
