I was invited to Sri Lanka in October 2018 to attend TBC Asia. It’s a biennial event organized by Cinnamon Hotels to honor the best travel bloggers in the business. We were a nominee for food best travel blog and came away with silver. Hooray!

Before the awards ceremony, all sixty nominees were taken on one of four press trips throughout the country. I went on the south tour and visited idyllic places along the coast like Hikkaduwa, Beruwala, Galle, and Mirissa. I saw blue whales for the first and only time in my life and got to go on safari at Yala National Park, a wildlife reserve known for having one of the highest concentration of leopards in the world. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any but it was still a highlight of the trip.

Most of my fellow nominees had been to Sri Lanka before so they left right after the awards ceremony. But not me. It was my first time here and after that incredible press trip, I wanted to see more.

I extended my stay so I could explore more of this beautiful country which Lonely Planet named its best place to visit in 2019.