First time in Colombo and we looked at Tripadvisor reviews before picking this hotel. The trip from airport to the hotel can be lengthy as traffic/roads are bad so arrange transport with a local driver. It is not in the downtown area, rather a bit of no-man’s-land between Wellawatte (beach, shops) and Bambalapitiya (shops) so walking out the door is not that interesting.

This is not your usual ‘tourist’ hotel – more an individual take on lodging. That said, the hotel itself is lovely – grand old style with great dining room, outdoor relaxing garden, pink-tiled pool with sunbaking out back and a chic outdoor bar (nightly). Our room was upstairs, first left, and a bit of noise carried through from below (noisy kids) but inside it was fine. Great tall ceilings with mezzanine lounge area, huge bed and lots of room. Not being able to open a window was a minus but fan/aircon was good and wifi worked fine everywhere. Service was attentive and smart and food quality was high. The local bus costs 20LKR to Fort/Pettah area so getting about is no problem. Go to Barefoot for local textiles, handicrafts and they have a nice outdoor cafe, too.

The city itself does not have much of interest compared to many other Asian cities - no wow factor monuments/temples/markets in my opinion but the friendliness of people makes up for it. Duck into a local eating house and you will probably be the only foreigner! I think 1 night is enough for Colombo, to be honest - many people just head out to the countryside straight-away but each to their own.

We hired a driver from Colombo - Millenium Elephant Foundation - Dambulla - Sigiriya - Nuwara Eliya - Tangalle - Colombo and it made for a hassle-free holiday. I sourced our driver from other Tripadvisor recommendations so thanks for people's feedback! I can recommend highly Sujith Liyanage - very friendly, good english, punctual and he shared insightful advice that made the trip have a more 'local' flavour. You can reach him on sujith.liyanage@gmail.com or +94 717252722 or you can contact me for more details.