Sri Lanka Master Thread

[mmgfarb]

Yes.  We paid for a one way from cmb to mle as going back from MLE we flew Etihad through AUH to JFK.
That portion we flew coach as less then 1 and half hour flight and coach was pretty decent.
The business actually looked really nice for such a short flight.
When I got home I saw that Sri Lankan air had sent me an email but went to my junk email, they had offered us an option to bid for a business seat a few days before our flight.
Unless it would have been really cheap probably would not have done it anyway.
Not that we had a lot of luggage but they let you have 30 kilo in coach.
Also, the one thing you have to be careful about is make sure to check in online but still be in the airport at least 2 hours (maybe even 3) before the flight.
We got lucky cause a new line opened up and we quickly moved over but it was crazy as there were hundreds of people trying to check in and didn't have enough lines open.
We heard someone complain that he had been waiting online for 3 hours.
It didn't seem to make a difference if you were business or did previous check in as all the lines were crazy long.

How much did you pay for the flight? You can book it with BA for 7.5k/15k Y/J if there's award space.

[iamhappyz]

I don't remember but I did the math at the time and it was cheaper to buy the ticket then to use the miles. It wasn't a lot of money.
If I remember correctly, the award was not available on BA where it would have made sense, only on AA and AA wanted more miles which didn't make sense to use.
I did however use my BA number more to extend my expiration date on my miles but did get some miles also from this trip.
In addition, because we specifically wanted the first flight out Sunday morning we didn't want to wait to see if it would become available on BA and wasn't an expensive ticket that worth the risk of waiting and then maybe paying more to get on the flight we wanted.

[mmgfarb]

I don't remember but I did the math at the time and it was cheaper to buy the ticket then to use the miles. It wasn't a lot of money.
If I remember correctly, the award was not available on BA where it would have made sense, only on AA and AA wanted more miles which didn't make sense to use.
I did however use my BA number more to extend my expiration date on my miles but did get some miles also from this trip.
In addition, because we specifically wanted the first flight out Sunday morning we didn't want to wait to see if it would become available on BA and wasn't an expensive ticket that worth the risk of waiting and then maybe paying more to get on the flight we wanted.

I would imagine that the tickets are pretty inexpensive. That's weird that BA didn't see availability if AA saw it, you probably could have gotten BA to book it over the phone but I guess it doesn't really matter in the end since you were booking revenue anyway.

[ponash123]

Thanks for posting this. I'm considering Sri Lanka for a summer trip so this is helpful (third world, dirty, and chaotic are the things my dreams are made of  )

[iamhappyz]

Just make sure to check depending where you are going in Sri Lanka will depend on what time of year you want to go.  They have monsoons so you don't want to go in the rainy season.  It is different depending if you are going north or south or east or west so double check depending on your itinerary.  You don't want to put a "damp"er on things!

[moish]

Whats the deal with Dengue?

[ponash123]

Anyone have thoughts on Ella vs Nuwara Eliya?
How about local villages to explore?

[Emkay]

Not sure if Emkay's prices are outdated or just because we did a lot of traveling in a day (we took for two days and was about 8 hours of long distance driving a day) but we were quoted $100 a day from every place that we emailed for a quote.

Why didn't you just ask Emkay for his drivers info?

[iamhappyz]

I thought I had sent you a post with a bunch of questions I had when I was planning this trip but never got a reply so I just planned it on my own.  It would have been helpful to have some info before we went.
The weird thing is that now I don't see that post.  Not sure if it is possible that it got deleted but I am almost positive that I saw it did get posted back then. I don't remember at this point if I did it on your TR or the master trip for Sri Lanka.  It could be that your driver would have been cheaper but we did a lot of driving in 2 days and most of the drivers were charging the same $100 a day but wouldn't do so much driving in one day and wanted to split into three days.  The first day we got in at 3:30 am and he drove us till about 6 pm and the next day was from 8 am - 12 midnight.  Really nice and accommodating person and could be if someone contacted him directly (as I did through someone working in Chabad) then maybe could get a little cheaper. I wanted someone who came with a recommendation so might have been good with your driver but I guess it was meant to be this way and it worked out fine.

[ponash123]

Do any of you know about local villages?

[Emkay]

Do any of you know about local villages?

I stopped by a bunch. I'll see if I can try to remember which one's.

[ponash123]

I stopped by a bunch. I'll see if I can try to remember which one's.

I'd appreciate it.
Looking in the Ella/Nuwara Eliya area

[theyankel]

thinking to stop in sri lanka from nepal on way to japan
looking at 26 hr layover
doesnt seem to be much info on the forums here
is it worth it to get out for the day? safe with kids? anything a must do?
or better look for alternate options ?