Engagement ring!

As Sri Lanka seems to be the home of gems and as there are many jewellery shops here Andy offers to buy Freddie an engagement ring. We read a little about it and it seems Galle Fort is as good a place as any with many reputable jewellers so off we go. We've got a bit of an idea of what we want so go in lots of places, including those recommended on the invaluable tripadvisor, and begin to get an idea of prices. Some of the gems are very expensive especially the blue sapphires which Sri Lanka is famous for and which Kate Middleton had in her engagement ring. Obviously you then have to factor in the price of the metal, white gold or silver and Fred likes chunky jewellery so gold isn't cheap! There are also lots of pretty semi precious stones and some of the places offer to make it from scratch overnight if you pick a design and a stone. It all becomes a bit bewildering but, in the end, we head back to the very first shop we went in and go for a beautiful silver ring with a star sapphire in the middle and two mini blue sapphires on either side. We both really liked it originally and think we've got a fair price. It just needs adjusting for size so we head off to the beach for an hour before picking it up ... Freddie loves it :-)

We decide to head to the beach area of Unawatuna tonight as we've heard good things and we leave the Galle area tomorrow. It's a really nice back packer type beach place and we have a drink on the beach as the sun goes down before having a wander and a really nice tuna steak and chips dinner.