Sri Lanka 8 February 2026. Just a bit of travel. Adelaide to Colombo

We left home at 7:30 and were checked in, through immigration and in the lounge by 8:30. That was really easy. Its the first time we have been in the new lounge on the other side of immigration at Adelaide airport, its comfortable, has all the things, but not lush.
We boarded our flight to KL at 10:25 and were in the air at 11:15am. For our 7hr first flight of the day. This is the first flight we have been on with lap/sash seatbelts, a bit different and we love different, but not quiet sure about this.
The flight was uneventful, and that’s always good. We landed at about 3:35pm at terminal C. We eventually found the lounge and asked about our next flight. That’s from terminal H we were told, you just take the train down there, it’s easy.
We had a 6 hour layover, so we settled in this lounge until about 7:15pm and then made our way down to the train. There were so many people getting the train, every train. Guess they are all switching terminals like us.
Our terminal was the first stop, or so I thought. I got off the train searching for a sign, Deb hung back on the train in case I wasn’t right. But all was good and we followed the arrows towards our gates area. And we found the lounge quite simply, and were settled back inby 7:35pm waiting for our 9:35pm boarding. Yes, it’s been a lot of waiting. But it was interesting watching this busy airport operate. So many planes coming and going and the frantic pace of all the ground services to support the planes.
It seems that Terminal H is for smaller planes, the same as Australian domestic services. They look tiny after spending a few hours watching the large international planes. But the frantic nature of all the workings of the airport were the same here. Such a busy large airport.
We were on board our Colombo bound flight at about 10:10pm. And there we sat, then the plane was pushed out, then pushed some more, a lot more. I would guess we were pushed backwards for at least 200 to 300m. Then we sat, stopped on the tarmac. After a while the Captain announced we would get moving again in 5 to10 mins, once the plane blocking our taxi path had moved out of the way, this was at about 10:55pm! We started taxiing again in a forward direction, which was novel, at 11pm, at least that was in the right direction, and in the air heading to Sri Lanka by 11:15pm. It was a bumpy ride across to Colombo, but other than that uneventful.
The flight was scheduled to be about 3:05hrs, that had landing at around 12:15 am, but we got in ”early” at 11:55pm Sri Lankan time (Deb worked out that was about 4:55am Adelaide time!!) The flight is notorious for being late, often very late, but it almost always leaves, very rarely cancelled!
Our travel agent, the amazing Jenni, organised a VIP service for us when we landed, that’s express assisted baggage collection and immigration and customs clearance. It’s a thing here, the airport runs the service, from taking you to the front of the immigration line, to collecting our luggage at taking it through customs. Our guide for our time in Sri Lanka, Hiru, met us just outside immigration and took us to a lounge while all the things happened. Deb was presented with a beautiful bunch of flowers and I got a flower lei. We were served tea and nibbles while we waited for all the things to be done. It was a great opportunity to get to know Hiru and take a bit of a breath.
We then drove to our hotel and settled in and to get some sleep before our adventures begin tomorrow (or is that today).
It’s now approaching 3am, thankfully our tour starts at 11am tomorrow. Hiru did joke that he was going to tell us 6:30am, but thought better of it, we had a good laugh at that.
Good night all, it all starts tomorrow.