SEC-S14W5 | My Biggest Travel in 2023 | Chill-out holidays at a Beach Villa 🌴🏖️

Hey Steemian friends!

First of all, I’m Sending a load of Christmas cheer your way! 🎄 I had a good holiday and took some free time this week even on the Engagement Challenge. So, now let's kick off the week with some holiday vibes with “My Biggest Travel in 2023”. I think my biggest travel was already published in my last entry where I wrote about “Adam's Peak” but here I will share another trip that leave lasting memories in 2023.

👉 Where you went during the year of 2023? What activities were carried out?

This trip was meant to chill-out and relax with friends. So, we decided to hit up the coast and booked a beach villa. The villa's name was "Morague Beach Villa". The agenda? Beach and pool all day, every hour. It was a non-stop fiesta of fun and relaxation. We stayed there for 02nights 03 Days.

^{Morague Beach Villa at Ambalangoda}

Google Map location
what3words: ///hillsides.decreased.bulletins

^{The shallow beach front is the best place to Unwind}

^{Pool time 😀🙈}

^{They want me dead I guess!}

^{It was beach to pool and pool to beach kinda holiday!}

👉 Any anecdote that makes this trip so unique to be considered the best one of '23? Did you experienced this alone or with somebody else?

I went with my best friends and their families. Both of them had kids so we were a group of 06 adults and two kids. My friends were with me from childhood. We were schooling together, so the bond between us was very strong. It was wonderful to go back in time to talk about all the silly stories we have done in the past. The trip became a time machine of nostalgia So I loved every minute I had with them and their families.

^{My buddies!}

👉 Have you planned a budget for it? How much you spent during the trip?

The beachfront villa didn't come cheap at Rs. 60,000 | US$180 | Steem 750 per night, but hey, memories are priceless. We didn’t do much budgeting though. We wanted to have a good relaxing time without thinking much about money. With expenses shared among three families, we kept things balanced and affordable for everyone.

^{Enjoying our meals}

Food was where we tightened the purse strings, sticking to reasonable options for most of the meal. In the end, we spent about Rs. 30,000 (375 Steem) on six meals and two snacks for the whole gang. I guess it’s a reasonable deal for such times.

To sum it up, we spend about 2500 Steem for the whole trip including liqueur and transportation.

^{Light Dinner to save some budget 😉}

👉 Are you thinking about to make an amazing travel in 2024? Which would be the selected place?

Absolutely! Every year, I surprise my mother on her birthday with a pilgrimage trip. Most of the years she hasn't had any clue where we're headed until the last possible moment so this year too I want to keep it a secret. Surprising her become a bit of a tradition for me and my family now. Though, this trip was on my Wishlist for a while I couldn’t make it due to several reasons.

^{Image source: google maps}

So, at least next year I plan to take this birthday surprise visit to the culturally rich wonders of Anuradhapura & Jaffna. Her birthday is in July so I would like to plan this trip around that time. The journey is around 420Km so I hope to make it at least 03 Nights 04 Days Trip. I’ll be using the train as my transportation method as I had a pleasant experience on my previous travel to Adam’s Peak. We will stay at Anuradhapura for one night as a resting place and then straight to Jaffna for the next two nights.

Thank you for this interesting contest @travelingsteem. Looking forward to taking on the next week’s challenge. I would like to invite @paholags, @tenguhatanga & @nooruleman to participate in this contest.

Thank you.

Peace to all 🙏

^{All the images are from my gallery. Some photos may have been used in other contests or articles belongs to me.}