Destination Sri Lanka, get the most out of it!

3 day’s ago we arrived in Colombo Sri Lanka!

We left Norway at 6am on the 14th of December, and the first stop was Brussels, Belgium, a 12 hour layover and then on our way to Abu Dhabi for another 8 hours there.

All of us are looking for the cheapest flight available. Of course we want to fly with a respected and safe airline.
But when most of us see one or two long layovers we just skip those options, and rather add 300-400 and even 500 dollars for a shorter trip.

We found our flight from Norway all the way to Bali Indonesia, via Brussels, Abu Dhabi and Sri Lanka for around 450USD with the best airline there is, Etihad!
They have the most leg space, comfortable seats, biggest TV screen, great food and awesome service.
The headphones they provide are like padded “proper” stereo headphones with great sound.
A little hygiene package and a “sleeper” package. They provided a sleeping mask, with one side saying “Do not disturb” and the other side “Wake me up to eat”, awesome!

I rather do layovers instead of direct flights, I feel better doing it and I get more out of my trip, this is of course when I got time doing this.

Arrived in Brussels after a great morning nap on the plane, took the train in to the city which took us 16 minutes and cost 8.50 euro.
We had 12 hours to kill in this city and we knew that this wouldn’t be a problem.
Brussels is famous for its beers, chocolate and foods!

While wandering the city your eyes are busy looking at all the incredible architecture.
Statues of heroic male and females carved in the buildings, some covered in gold!
Massive wooden doors where it looks like you have to be a few to be able to open and close it.
The roofs are my kind of roofs, copper and zinc sheet metal roofing, all in different patterns and shapes, majestic!
We walked around looking at all this while sipping on some hot wine, the perfect drink for a cold day, I’ll throw down 2.50euro any day of the week for some hot wine!

We also went for some bar hopping , trying different Belgium beers, interesting taste, it’s definitely nothing like anything els, with a hint of fruitiness , but perfect bitterness to not make a face and actually enjoy it!
These beers are around 6-10% so it will get to you! We had tons of fun.
One half liter beer for about 4.50 euro.

Food, they have a lot of different influences from all over Europe, and there is restaurants everywhere!

We sat down at a place just around the corner from one of the biggest squares in the area.
We had garlic infused snails with different kind of herbs, insanely good!
To this you get white bread you dip in this garlic sauce, yummy!
Deep fried cheese together with a green salad with mustard dressing, what a mouth orgasm.
Two bowls of blue mussels boiled in some kind of selleri broth!
I drank the broth at the end, I would never leave anything that good!
For dessert we got a Belgium waffle covered in caramel sauce!

I loved all of this, this meal was incredible and for the price of 12 euros!!

The day just fly by and suddenly we had to be back at the airport.
Already checked in and luggage sorted, all the way to our first “main” stop Sri Lanka, so nothing to worry about!
I spent about 100 USD on this and all the coffees I had, we even had a massive Nutella pancake included in the price!

It’s not hard or it doesn’t take much more time to actually make a layover like this awesome, we had so much fun and still saved money on this cheap flight.
Yes, we spent money in Brussels, but we got to see and experience a bit from a new country, stretched our legs for next flight and had tons of fun!
Many countries you fly to have visa on arrival so need to feel stressed about having to send away your passport to arrange this in advance.

So just looks that up and enjoy your time. (Visa on arrival)

Then we had a 6 hour flight to Abu Dhabi, which for the most of it I slept through.
Still going with Etihad so making the best out of your time is to go with an airline like this!
It doesn’t get easier traveling the world then an European, and also for my girlfriend that is Canadian it was easy!
Outside the airport you’ll find taxis all over, they will come up to you and ask if they can help, if you don’t feel secure with your research about prices then just go for the taximeter, you can find out about prices at Taxi-Calculator
First stop the Grand Mosque, super early morning and everything was closed, the entry for this opened at 9am, we were 2 hours early!
But to see this enormous mosque, it walls and towers around was extraordinary.
This is supposed to be the 8th biggest in the world, but by the look of it it seems way bigger!
(I have seen many mosques).

From there we walked around for a bit , closer to the city, but as usual everything seems closer and to walk their was not an option!
We took a taxi into the big beach Corniche!
A big white sand beach along the city, the beach strip had a lot of restaurants and coffee shops.
Early morning was pretty chillier than expected, but as they day went by the typical desert heat struck us.
Massive skyscrapers and buildings scattered all over the city, you can definitely feel that this city is built up by the money made from oil.
Beautiful city and a great general vibe, very nice and helpful people.
The trip into the city and back to the airport cost about 40 USD, for the distance it’s a great price!

As well as Brussels we had no problem killing this layover time, we enjoyed every single bit of it, experiencing two new countries, foods and drinks.
It’s always interesting to meet the people and experience different cultures!
The extra time spent in transit is definitely worth it.

Do your research , experience more and fly cheaper!

 Fianlly we have arrived in Colombo ,Sri Lanka!
So far so awesome!
Yesterday morning we took a train up to Sigiriya a 7 hours one, which was pretty alright! We managed to get 2 “couches” for ourselves so we could actually lay down and sleep.
The people here are amazing, very friendly and helpful, telling us what train to get on and when to get off.

I’ll give some updates as soon as possible!

Monkey Out!