Galle, Sri Lanka

It's easy to see why people fall in love with Galle; it has a quiet calm and historic charm that makes wandering the little walled town a delight. Outside the fortified ramparts lies an urban sprawl that was heavily destroyed by the terrible wrath of the sea a decade ago, and has been rebuilt to be a typically modern south-east Asian city, but inside is something special.

The Portuguese influence has all but faded but the legacy of the Dutch and British remains in the quaint and crumbling architecture that is being maintained, restored and reinvigorated in each and every street. Churches and houses, shops and restaurants, courtyards and boutiques all have a distinctly quaint feel with cutting edge hotels designed in strict accordance with the protected architectural heritage. It's no surprise that we often spy film crews shooting on the picturesque streets.

We start each day with early morning runs around the fortress walls, a double circuit of which is an exhausting 4km, even in the pre-breakfast heat and humidity. We are joined on our dawn jogs by various locals, some of whom are sensibly walking rather than running while others do bootcamp-style exercises on the ramparts.

From our elevated vantage points we see schoolchildren in their white uniforms starting their day at 7am by standing in line in the playground as the national anthem is played. Elsewhere churches, mosques and Arabic centres are open, with Galle's native population being predominantly Muslim and Christian, with only one Buddhist temple of note to be found.

However, Thursday morning sees the early morning streets filled with wedding parties as at least 15 different couples and their entourages pose for photos around the town, it being an auspicious day in both the Buddhist and Hindu astrological calendar. They start early to beat both the tourist traffic and the heat that builds as the sun climbs higher.

We wisely head to the coast most days as the temperature in the town is so oppressive, but spend our last full day pottering around the streets, taking in all the sights one last time, checking out museums and antique shops and buying souvenirs.

It's bakingly hot, with regular stops for water and even passion fruit and pineapple ice cream just to keep us going. Peter tells us that our hotel facade needs to be repainted every three weeks to keep it looking fresh as the relentless tropical air degrades it so quickly.

Evenings are also very humid but their balmy nature makes them perfect for al fresco dining and we sit out one night with the waves crashing below us at a restaurant on the upper level of the Old Dutch Hospital complex called, strangely, A Minute By Tuk Tuk, which serves the best prawn dish I've ever tasted for just £4.

Other nights we eat at The Heritage Cafe on Pedlar Street, and the restaurant at our very own Fort Printers hotel, underneath the twinkling lights around the frangipani trees. We also discover a couple of fabulous bars, despite Galle's nightlife being essentially non-existent.

The Hammock Bar in the Old Dutch Hospital is fun and quirky, being exactly as described but it's the newly-opened Living Room that is a jaw-dropper; a deliriously funky bar-club-gallery-treasure trove that intrigues and delights every where you look.

The brainchild of three Swedish designers it is crammed with sumptuous furniture, fabulous art, quirky objects, eccentric decor and beautiful waiters in plunging V's serving the occasional customer and generally wafting around the place. Hidden in a side street in sleepy Galle it's a revelation.

We spend our final afternoon in Sri Lanka channelling colonial splendour at the grandest hotel in town, now called Amangalla, but famous for many years as The New Oriental. We sit on the verandah having high tea, eating the kind of patisserie that wouldn't be out of place at the Ritz. It's a last bit of indulgence before our journey back to reality - and a bloody big diet - starts!

A new driver picks us up at 5.30pm and speeds us back to Colombo airport, a three hour drive, the last 25km of which are lined with thousands of Papal and Sri Lankan flags on poles literally every ten metres either side of road until we reach the airport. It must have taken days and cost a fortune to prepare - let's hope Pope Francis was looking out of the windows as he sped along!

We have a long, long wait for our midnight flight to Mumbai, made even more interminable by the fact that there are no bars or restaurants at the airport, just little sandwich stands. And then all the joys of Indian immigration again at 3am just so that we can check into an airport hotel for 18 hours before our Virgin Atlantic flight back to London in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Sri Lanka and Kerala have been truly amazing but now the dream is over and winter is coming. Farewell to all, and happy travels...