Real men love guns

It's always nice to spread the love.

Feel pretty tough huh.

Lisbon

Lollipop tower

Lisbon beats Paris hands down.

You can't see the swimming pool but the dude on the diving board did a perfect triple pike dive after the photo was taken.

Is that disrespectful?

Where am I again?

They must have been scared of someone

and there wasn't a princess in the tower either.

Hanging with the hoodies.

Paris

This was last August and it was my first sightseeing holiday in a long time.

For someone that hates religion I sure like the decor.

Too cool for school.

This place is like the biggest hen party you've ever seen and that's just the queue. Not so seedy.

No sign of Tom or the Knights Templer; I couldn't find them at St Sulspice either?

Jim wake up! It's time for the cash-in reunion tour.

Pray for Me.

This is without doubt the worst form of transportation ever, worst than Rollerblades and they're seriously bad. Unfortunately for me it's Zhenya's favourite form of transportation and I got to be the grumpy bastard for not wanting to join in all the fun.

My favourite part of all Paris. A set of steps outside a Church looking out over Paris with some dude selling euro beers. Cheers buddy. There nothing quite so sophisticated as an Englishman abroad.

Next Best

It's super long since I posted anything (self imposed hibernation) and whilst thinking about buying tickets for this years Bestival I found some photos from last years.

Get your drunk on.

Castle Greyskull.

Turn on the Bright Lights!

Roll Forever

Rust Ramp, Portland.

Hikkaduwa Perahera

As I left Hik to get the bus I ran into the local once a year street carnival.
I walked through the cars and people to get a photo at the head of the parade.
All the traffic was backed up so I walked the kilometre into town past the whole procession.
Due to the holiday the bus service was greatly reduced and it took me an hour to catch a bus back to Colombo. Even after getting on the bus there were carnivals all along the route that slowed down the bus and it took me ages to get back.

Buddha's Birthday

This was actually several weeks before I left Sri Lanka in May when the Buddhists celebrate Buddha's birth, death and enlightenment. It's a big public holiday where there's free food available and everyone is out celebrating.
Banana Man had to work though.
I'd never seen so many Sri Lankan's on the beach! It was even more startling as the holiday season was over so there were no tourists and the week before the beach had been empty.
Beach side parking under the coconut palms.

Countdown to Departure

This was the first of several last drinks that I'll be having over my last 2 weeks in Sri Lanka.

The engineering department came out to drink to my departure. I think I've definitely lightened up a bit since I've been working with these guys and girls in Sri Lanka.

Baz & Viv

Another tropical sunset. We'd stayed in Hikkaduwa for the first couple of days, hopped down the coast to Unawattuna and ended up in Mirissa. I'd managed to catch a few waves at each spot but was having an ongoing battle with various reefs that kept trying to tear chunks off me. Out of the water I was limping but in the water I was ok. The waves weren't pumping on this day but I'd had a good surf right out front of the hotel the day before.

Baz and I ventured up onto parrot rock, which was situated bang in front of our hotel.
I may be starting to suffer from too much good living and I think my corpse makeup is beginning to run (I haven't gone goth, it's just a liberal coat of zinc oxide to protect myself from the sun). Boards on board after getting back from Wellagama. 2 boards on top and 3 people inside. Baz was keeping up appearances but I'm still in my knackered rash vest (surf top).

Baz bringing the message to Sri Lanka, Hope not Hate. Baz made a new friend who supplied us with low buget local food for breakfast and a packed lunch (curry and rice) for our journey back to Hikkaduwa.My sense of timing is impeccable and somehow I managed to take this photo (it's actually at night) just as the lightning lit up the sky/beach. Lightning or not it wasn't distracting Viv from her meal.

Hikkaduwa was super quiet but the sun was still out most of the time and I'm getting as much sun as possible before I have to come back to the UK. My friend Gamini is coming with me to the East coast for 1 week to show me the surf spots before I have to leave.

Mowlam Family goes elephant hunting

After mum escaped from hospital and everyone was reunited we loaded up and headed out looking for big game.

Dad spotted a likely suspect and set about trying to lure his prey.
From a different angle maybe we were the ones that should be watching out.

On second thought perhaps we should just be friends.
I always think the babies look like little old dudes; must be the wrinkles and thinning hair. Actually come to think of it I also think human babies look like little old people for the same reason. Stampede, everyone get out the way!

Post elephant relaxation time. How about a nice cup of tea? So it's off to the tea factory for some of Ceylon's finest.We had the factory tour and finished off by tasting the produce. The day was a big success and it was nice to have mum back with us again.