I have recently been to Srilanka. Overall it was a great experience the scenery lived up to the hype. Sure, here’s a list of key tips

- reserve your tourist train tickets in advance as it gets booked up very quickly. You can do this online (personally i opted for a driver as I was travelling with a small child so the convenience of being able to stop was more important for us)

- ⁠driving is not for the faint hearted, just hire a driver. People in the capital and surrounding areas don’t respect road rules. In the central provinces it’s better

- ⁠take cash with you. Restaurants do accept card but not all

- ⁠halal food is available but only in certain pockets of Colombo and kandy and other highly populated Muslim areas. We found certain places such as Ella were full of people telling us everything was halal which was complete nonsense because they had pork on the menu. So just something to be mindful of that if it’s not Muslim owned, best stick to veggie options

- ⁠Ella was beautiful but surprisingly full of what seemed to be bars and European backpackers everywhere. I wouldn’t recommend staying more than a day here to be honest

- ⁠go with an open mind, it’s an incredibly beautiful country when you get out of the city but be mindful that it is very poor so some of the conveniences we take for granted here such as a nice coffee shop or imported brands were hard to come by

- ⁠make sure you go for a tea plantation tour, the country is famous for it and you definitely appreciate your morning cuppa a lot more

- ⁠like every Asian country, the tuktuk guys will rip you off so make sure you negotiate.