Originally posted on HMWS Blog:
Tea Planters of yesteryears had a taste for good things of life. They built their luxurious villas with immaculately kept gardens and orchards, in the most scenic spots. Nowadays, most of them have become upmarket boutique hotels. Viharagala in Haputale in the central hills is one such tea bungalow The…
Originally posted on HMWS Blog:
Last week I took the train from Fort Station in Colombo to Haputalle in the Hill Country. I stayed the night in a Tea Bungalow and travelled by train again to Colombo the next day. This is the story of that journey ? Sri Lanka’s railway network was introduced by…
Originally posted on HMWS Blog:
It has been an unusually colourful but cold, wet autumn. It will be a hard winter they said. I packed a bag and flew to my second home in Sri Lanka – for three months. ? Flight EK 018 On a cold and blastery November morning, I took a taxi…
It’s been some time since I went to any Test match. It was a lovely surprise when my Christmas presents last December included tickets to the Edgbaston Ashes Test in July I drove to Birmingham, left the car in the small basement car park of the Pentahotel on Ernest Street and walked to the…
Carlos Santana turned sixty eight last week. Few days later he was at the London O2. I went to see him. I drove to London that Saturday morning, left the car at my daughter’s and took the DLR to the O2. The new swish cable car they call the Emirates Air Line took me across the Thames.…
Early on in the week we made Harira for supper – the Moroccan thick soup with chickpeas, lentils, rice, tomatoes, garlic and ginger. It didn’t come out quite the way neither the recipe nor we intended, so we added loads of leftover roast guinea fowl from the previous evening to it and opened a bottle of…
It is already mid-summer but days with good summer weather have been few. Week 28 was no exception. Buying exciting new wines and walking in the Yorkshire Dales were the highlights of the week WINE The man from Enotria Wine Cellars popped in at the beginning of the week. He had driven all the way…
“The Regent’s Canal is one of London’s best-kept secrets – a peaceful haven often hidden by the surrounding buildings. Today it is well-loved by boaters, walkers and cyclists all looking to escape the capital’s busy streets” The 13.8 kilometre canal, completed in 1820, links the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union Canal, just north-west of Paddington Basin in the west,…
The other day, we had breakfast at Dishoom, the Bombay Irani cafe at Kings Cross where English food comes with an Indian twist. The cavernous but elegant converted warehouse is cosy, beautifully furnished and lit. Waiters smile. The barman adds spices to cocktails. Joss sticks burn and the air smells sweet. You feel instantly comfortable.…
London’s Brick Lane has an amazing street food market at weekends. I went there this morning and this is what I saw:
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