London – Fergy's Rambles.

You don’t get rid of me that easily!

Well folks,

here we are again and, believe me, I am probably more surprised than you. “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated “ to quote or possibly misquote Mark Twain although my sudden departure from this blog may have seemed as though that unfortunate event had occurred. Trust me it has not although there have been times during my hiatus when I Thought the Grim Reaper was stalking me and, frankly, times when I would not have been overly annoyed if he was.

I should explain that the apparently random images that appear here and which I have hopefully managed to annotate are of my current trip which, frankly, I was not sure would ever happen. Hopefully, they indicate why I love travelling and writing about it. There will be full explanations in due course as to what they represent.

Coming back to Kandy.

Hello again folks and welcome back to my series about my 2016 trip to Sri Lanka which begins here, should you wish to read it in it’s entirety.

If you are finding my blog for the first time, a very warm welcome and if you have read the previous posts you’ll know that I was staying with my dear friend Treshi in the tiny village of Mattegoda which is near Kottawa about 13 miles South of central Colombo. Mattegoda is about as far off the tourist track, which was then so important to the Sri Lankan economy before it was destroyed and the loss of which is crippling the country economically, as you could imagine.

These were much happier times so if you wish to find out what happens next then please read on.

Kottawa calling.

Welcome back folks and I do hope you have read my previous meanderings about going to stay with my very dear friend Treshi in a village nobody has probably ever heard of in a completely out of the way backwater in Sri Lanka.

Back in 2015 and long before the Chinese virus effectively ended international travel I was actually allowed to go overseas and I chose to return to Sri Lanka because I loved it so much. Sadly that simple pleasure has been taken away from me, probably for the remainder of my life, so this series is just a happy memory of better times and is not intended as any sort of meaningful guide. At time of writing I know that Sri Lanka is under strict house arrest until at least 14th June, 2021 and more probably until at least the end of the month.

I had somehow or another made it to Treshi’s home in a tiny little village called Mattegoda (she no longer lives there so forget it, potential stalkers!), I was in a place I had been ordered to call my home (Treshi orders you in the nicest possible way). Having been made more than welcome we had to work out an arrangement of some sort. If you want to know what it was then please read on.

It’s happened again!

Hello again and welcome to my latest little escapade on the blog which I do assure you will be a lot shorter than the last two for which there are several reasons and, before you quite understandably wonder what nonsense I am going to come out with to explain such a paucity of content for another three month trip, please read on.

Lock-down Diaries #17.

Hello again one and all and welcome to what is my 17th Lock-down Diary and exactly two months since I posted my last one although I have frankly very little to report. I have spent those two months effectively doing nothing bar complete a fairly large series of posts about a 2014 trip to Canada.

If you have not read some or all of it I shall not put you through the hassle of scrolling back 37 posts (yes, it was that long) so if you want to read the whole piece from the beginning you can do so here. If you want to know about the little which has actually happened to me then please read on.

Lock-down Diaries #16.

Hello as always one and all and welcome to my rambles both physical and verbal and I am not actually sure which takes the most out of me!

First things first and a quick explanation for me regular readers who were probably expecting a piece with lots of technical information about my 2014 trip to Sri Lanka which I had mentioned but I have decided against it for various reasons.

Most of the information is out of date now, especially in the light of the pandemic and there is no way of knowing when travel to that country, or anywhere else, will be possible or what the situation there will be as and when it might be possible again. I thought I would post a Lockdown Diary instead to give you a bit of an update about the site and my current situation, the former of which seems to be doing well and the latter much less so.

Lock-down Diaries #14.

Lock-down diaries # 14.

All together now, “Awwwwwwwwww”, isn’t he lovely?

Hello again one and all and thanks as always for taking the time to drop by my little blog here and, after the horrendously long offering last time, I shall be surprised if anyone can even face another excursion into the deranged world I inhabit. I promise you that I shall try to make this one a lot less wordy and there will be a few images to hopefully brighten up your day in these continuing awful times.

OK, I should probably qualify that last statement a little. If you are a professional photographer or even a gifted amateur like so many of my friends then my efforts with a succession of cheap compact cameras and absolutely zero talent for the medium will probably end up driving you into a fit of depression when you see them but I mean well, honestly. If you wish to have a look, please feel free to dive in by pressing the “read more” button.

Lock-down Diaries #13.

Well, what can I say apart from thank you? Following my last entry when I resumed blogging after my apathetic self-imposed hiatus for three months my stats for viewing figures went through the roof. It seems like I was briefly a (very minor) underground hit in the blogosphere as I believe it is called. Get me with the techspeak. Maybe the very old and fairly battered dog can learn new tricks after all. Honestly, thank you all so very much, it really is appreciated.

Shame it didn’t last long but my enthusiasm for blogging like my enthusiasm for anything at all in the miserable existence I am now leading evaporated as soon as it briefly flared up. If you want to know why I am writing this post now then you know the drill, just click on the read more button below. I’ll even throw you in a description of the stunning vista of the four walls of my living room for nothing!

Lock-down Diaries #10.

Is there anybody going to listen to my story? Frankly, I would not blame you if you didn’t and I cannot believe what started off as a bit if fun at the start of what was just another Chinese virus like swine ‘flu or chicken ‘flu has now run to an entry in double figures in a world that has been irrevocably changed since the back end of last year (Western, not Lunar obviously). Yes, this is Lock-down Diary #10 and that in itself astounds me but what amazes me even more is the fact that people are still reading this stuff.

At this point I’d like to thank everyone that keeps reading this but especially to my new readers in Taiwan and Iraq, yes really. I know it is probably a generational thing and young people today consider this quite normal but for a man born in the 1950’s as I was the fact that people from those distant and hugely interesting countries, both of which I’d love to visit incidentally, would even be looking at my idiocy here is something that takes me aback every time I look at my stats page. A global village the world most certainly is now and if you want to enter my latest little ramble round it, you know the drill, just click the “read more” button below and I’ll see you on “the dark side” as I believe the Star Wars scriptwriters had it.

Continue reading “Lock-down Diaries #10.”

Lock-down Diaries #9.

Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends, we’re so glad you could attend, come inside. Come inside one and all for what will be the ninth in this series which started as a bit of a piece of nonsense to pass the time during house arrest and has grown into easily my most popular group of postings notwithstanding the effort I put into my historical travel blogs. They seem to get somewhat swallowed up and disappear because I back-post them and only my close personal friends ever read them. There may be a lesson there somewhere.

As always, it could not be simpler, if you want to jump into my latest little adventure then simply press the “read more” button below and you’ll be most welcome.

Continue reading “Lock-down Diaries #9.”