Jay, his younger sister, and I arrived at around 12:40 pm. Getting here seems longer than ever even though we stayed on the tolled expressway for much of our trip. Once the expressway ends, it dumps everyone into an area where the roads weren't upgraded for the new connection. So we saved a half hour only to lose the time in a traffic jam near the end of the journey.
We're here for the New Year. Well, we're spending tonight in the Nugegoda house. Earlier this winter, we bought two rooms for a one night stay in one of the oldest refurbished buildings in Colombo. We will stay in the Steuart by Citrus tomorrow.
The main Sri Lankan celebrations for the New Year take place along the Galle Face Green, the core of the city that touches the Indian Ocean. Tens of thousands of people generally flock to the area on the evening of December 31st to ring in the New Year. It would be a logistical impossibility to travel in either direction on busy New Years Eve. This is the reason we booked the rooms which seem cheap by Canadian standards. We can walk to the hotel. None of us have ever attended this event before.
The remainder of our day after the trip was laid back. I'm nearly over the little cold I had when flying back from Dubai. I'm ready for a new experience and a proper way to ring in 2026.