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Honeymoon Series 3 – Sri Lanka

by Claire Chanelle

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If you haven’t seen my Sri Lanka and India video on Youtube yet click HERE

The second destination of our honeymoon was Sri Lanka. Our plan was just to visit the Maldives but Paris has never been to India and seeing as it’s only a few hours flight away from the Maldives we decided to visit India too. I was happy because I love India and really wanted to visit the Taj Mahal. The reason why we squeezed in Sri Lanka in the middle is because it’s literally in-between the two places. We booked this holiday via KENSINGTON & PEARL a new luxury travel agent. They suggested Sri Lanka and they planned this entire trip. We jam packed so much in a short space of time, organising all then best places to visit as well as hotels and a driver. We didn’t have to do a thing, everything was planned for us; from airport picks up to driving us around the entire country. Our driver was available to us 24/7 and our driver was telling us all about the places and the culture. We soaked up so much and all hassle free. I really recommend using a tour operator to plan such a huge trip, you want to make sure you see as much as possible and they do all the work for you. KENSINGTON & PEARL is a luxury travel agent who specialise in exotic, luxury trips and they are based in Kensington, London. If you would like to do the same trip as us or maybe or you want to plan a bespoke holiday for your honeymoon, click here to visit the website or email: contact@kensingtonandpearl.com They have an instagram here too. This tour operator can also organise activities and restaurants which is beyond any other travel agent I have dealt with before. They can arrange anything from private jets to luxury cars driving you around. We didn’t have any jets or luxury cars 🙂

I can not recommend this tour operators enough, everything ran smoothly, I was really impressed with the service and the itinerary that they made for us. You even get a leather travel wallet and travel tags. I loved these little personal touches. Now each time I travel I have the perfect travel wallet and it will remind me of my honeymoon.

The first hotel we visited was 6,600 ft in the mountains of Nuwara Eliya. Be warned this place is six hours drive from the airport, it was a long drive. We didn’t mind because we had a big comfy car, comfy enough to sleep and we just wanted to soak up the view. We both really wanted to experience the tea plucking and see every part of Sri Lanka. It was a long journey but looking back I am so pleased we did it.

We had a late night spa treatment, if I am totally honest it wasn’t the best spa. I had a tiny room with a really loud air conditioning noise. The rooms were pretty basic but it fitted with the traditional factory setting. The customer service was great and everyone was really friendly. It seems to be the best hotel in that area of the mountain tea plucking but don’t expect pure, pure luxury.

We woke up at 6:30am to have breakfast and then we went straight to the tea plucking. The view and the landscapes were breathe taking and the plucking was the most amazing experience. We dressed in the local attire and picked fresh tea leaves for 30 mins. It was really hard work, apparently we were extremely slow and not very good. Really great experience.

The weather was a little chilly in the mountains but still warm and sunny. I wore trousers and summer top which was perfect. I wore these trousers the entire holiday in Sri Lanka and India. They were so cheap, come with a top and they were so light and comfy to wear. I would screw them up in my case and they never creased. Click here to shop, the best buy for a holiday or dinner date at home. My blue off the shoulder top is from Spotted on Celeb, click here. 

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The next stop was Kandy. I am glad we visited all these places, we really did see so much. Personally if I was recommending this trip to a friend I would say skip Kandy. It is famous for the temple of the sacred tooth. If you love temples and want to see everywhere like Paris then go but other wise I wouldn’t say it was breathtaking or a must see place. The temple was over crowded, I was hot and restless, the hotels were all quite dated and I wasn’t loving this part of the holiday. With that said Paris really enjoyed it, the hotel staff were really nice and at least this is one more place in the world I have visited. Our trip was tailor made to us and Paris was the one that wanted to see EVERYWHERE. If you want to only go to relaxing places, or beach spots then KENSINGTON & PEARL will tailor make your trip.

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The final designation of Sri Lanka was Koggala, this was a beach destination; a lot more relaxing. Our room was so nice and this hotel had a more luxury feel to any of the others. We enjoyed the spa and saw a herbal doctor who told Paris he was a stress head and needs to talk to trees. I loved it!

At breakfast little munchkin creatures would sit on our table, they were so cute.

The beach in Sri Lanka was so surreal. The water is really aggressive so majority of the time we were not allowed in the sea so be careful of this. I saw the strangest things: people walking with snakes and all kinds of animals. I try to stay away from these things as I feel they are exploiting the animals for money. One mental thing did happen to me. I was reading my Kindle on the beach (reading one of my gangster or child abduction novels) I felt really relaxed when suddenly I felt something heavy and furry jump on me. I was so scared I didn’t even scream. I turned around and saw a monkey on my sun lounger. I thought it was wild and went into a little state of shock thinking he would steal my CHANEL clutch, phone and then bite me and give me a disease. Okay slightly dramatic but this is how my mind works. I then saw man running over and then noticed the monkey had a lead. Security then ran over because the locals are not allowed to disturb the guests. Relaxing snoozing session soon ended.

This monkey really worried me the entire holiday. Turns our he was actually a she and she was called LaLa. LaLa grabbed onto me and hugged me, when the man came over to take her she grabbed onto me so tight like she didn’t like the man. Then Paris came over and she did the same to him. I felt really sorry for her and couldn’t understand why she was on a lead. I asked everyone and apparently pet monkeys are really common in Sri Lanka and India but they are mostly kept to make money. This isn’t Europe, of course we will see strange things like this and exotics animals kept as pets but it still bothered me. The man didn’t ask us of money, I think he was just relieved I didn’t complain and he got his monkey back. I hope LaLa is happy in the world right now.

The blue lace dress I am wearing is from Spotted on Celeb, here and my swimsuit is also from Spotted on Celeb, here. My sunglasses are from Finest seven, here. 

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The last activity we squeezed in was visiting the elephant sanctuary in Pinnawala. This caused so much controversy on my Snapchat but I am going to stand my ground and make it clear what I saw. Apparently the Pinawala sanctuary treats their elephants badly. First of all I didn’t see any elephants chained; the elephants were roaming free and the only thing separating them from us were small rocks on the floor and some men that was giving them hay. One elephant came over to me, literally walked right over to me, I stroked her and then she calmly walked off again on her own accord. I found out after that they are not meant to come that close and I was not allowed to touch one but I didn’t know. The elephant wasn’t forced to come over to me and no one pushed her away. She wasn’t harmed, the rule of the park is not to touch the elephants.

We also spoke to the director of the sanctuary because we were part of a mini investigation. Our tour guide was the minister or tourism and he wanted to follow us around the park to see how the elephants were being treated when no managers were around. One worker got in trouble because he asked us to take a photo with the elephant if we gave him a tip; this is not allowed and he got taken away to be told off. This to me does not show bad treatment. If people have experienced anything negative here maybe it is true but I didn’t see any mistreated animals or chained elephants. You can not ride the elephants here.

When we left the park we walked across the road and saw a lake full of elephants. I have no idea if they are apart of the sanctuary, someone told us they were not and they come from the forest; we saw them all walk out of the forest. They were all roaming around and a few men were in the lake washing them. A man gave me some bananas and I fed one. This was the highlight of my trip, a fabulous memory I will never forget. If anyone is disturbed by this I am sorry if it offends you and maybe you can leave a comment and we can discuss it. If I am unaware of anything and you think I should know why it is wrong, I would happily talk about it.

My playsuit is from Spotted on Celeb here.

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We stayed in Sri Lanka for four nights. It seemed like we were there two weeks because we did so much, but that was down to our tour operator that organised it. If you would like to know more about the hotels we stayed in or anything related to the holiday please visit KENSINGTON & PEARL or email: contact@kensingtonandpearl.com

Next stop India.

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CC xx

THANK YOU KENSINGTON & PEARL for organising the most perfect, jam packed trip 🙂

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5 comments

Sally April 1, 2016 - 8:48 pm

OMG I love the pics…… All looks stunning… Love LaLa….. Is that woman walking a skunk!!!!!!!! … I love the snap chats of honeymoon … Off to watch vlog….. Your u tube is BRILLANT love it

Reply
Chouquette April 2, 2016 - 7:28 am

Yes I know how funny! So many strange pets. Thanks for all your lovely comments 🙂 xx

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PhotoFashion April 2, 2016 - 4:27 am

Wow beautiful. Great images. I loved all your outfits.

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Chouquette April 2, 2016 - 7:29 am

Thank you for taking the time to comment xx

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Sabrina April 4, 2016 - 12:56 pm

I loved this post! I went to Sri Lanka and The Maldives for my honeymoon too but it was years ago so I never got to blog about it – seeing these snaps are bringing it all back to life for me. I adore that jumpsuit you are wearing to bathe the elephants and the photos of you two with the monkeys are so adorable!!!

http://clutchandcarryon.com/the-conrad-maldives-rangali-island/

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