Into the Hills

No, not those hills. Heidi, Audreena and Spencer are nowhere in sight.

A 5 hour bus journey took us through the green hills of Sri Lanka, into Kandy. The steep and winding roads made for beautiful views, as well as a hair-raising journey - the driver seemed determined to stay as close to the sheer drop of the roads edge as possible. Despite this, Ashley managed to get some sleep until she was rudely awoken by a broken fire hydrant spurting through the open window and onto her face.

With no hostel booked, we wandered around Kandy looking for the right combination of price, cleanliness and location and came across the Golden View for 1,600Rs (£10). It was a great place, which seemed to house or involve all the family, children and all. We ended up staying there 5 nights in total.

There is a lot on offer both within and around Kandy with breakfast incredibly easy to come by in one of its many bakeries - from samosas and rotty to sweet bread and tea buns. We spent a day in the city itself making a few purchases along the way. Richard had some linen trousers made to measure in under two hours for just 2,500Rs (£15). They will provide important knee coverage for temples for the rest of our trip. We also came across a stall selling the same products we saw when we visited the spice garden. Richards almond cream rage came flooding back when the stall owner showed us the prices - 400Rs instead of 4,000Rs for example. We had another go at bartering when a ring in a jewelery shop that we passed caught Ashley's eye. Expressing only a slight interest, the guys in the shop got her in and sat her down immediately saying the ring was 7,000Rs (£45 and way beyond what we were looking to spend). As we made to leave, the price plummeted to 3,500Rs and then once again to 2,800Rs (£17). It was still more than we wanted to pay, but just shows how inflated the original price can be. 

Washing fruit and veg at Kandy's market

Richard's trousers being run through the old Singer sewing machine

The same evening, we went to watch a  Kandyan dance show. One of the hostel workers, Takka, offered us a lift for just 20Rs, but as it was a lovely evening and only a 20 minute walk around Kandy's picturesque lake, we politely declined. As we made our way towards the venue, a tuk-tuk honked it's horn and pulled up beside us. It was Takka heading home before his night shift. As he drove us to the venue free of charge, he told us about his 1 and a half year old son, his love of Arsenal football team and his place within the 1st XI of the Kandyan Football Team, puffing his chest out proudly as he did so.

Just before the show began, an incident kicked off in front of us. Alone, a sweaty, middle-aged man sat himself between two couples and got out his mobile phone to call someone. He told the person on the other end of line how he had just made friends with an elephant, watching it strip and eat a log, before he discovered that he had inadvertently found his way on to Sri Lankan army territory, having been discovered by a couple of troops. That was as far as he got as, without warning, the man on his left lent across and began trying to rip the mobile from his hand. The quite large, bullish (possibly German) man wrestled with what was a small, scrawny and slightly nerdy man for his phone and bystanders (including us) looked on in disbelief. Admittedly the 'elephant man' was quite loud and crass, but he was obviously excited about his recent adventure and, alone, wanted to share it with someone. The nerdy guy went to move seats just as the show began and so the two were forced to remain sat together, shoulder to shoulder, for the entire performance - you could almost see the tension.

After the 'warm up act', the dance show itself was great fun. male and female dancers enthusiastically threw themselves around in order to represent cobras and peacocks, drive away evil spirits and pay homage to deities. Drummers played throughout as men jangled in their dresses which held 64 golden ornaments, masked dancers moved around freakishly and men ate (and licked) fire and walked across burning coals. 

The energetic Kandyan dancers

When the show ended we went to an evening service at the Sacred Temple of the Tooth Relic which is said to contain one of Buddhas Teeth. The evening light coupled with the call to prayer playing over the PA system and the Kandyan drummers playing on entry created an ominous air, which gave the temple experience a completely different atmosphere. 

The entrance to the Sacred Temple of the Tooth

Just outside of Kandy were the Royal Botanical Gardens. As well as containing various orchids, palms, cacti, flowers, medicinal herbs (not that kind) and bamboo, it also holds what seems to be the majority of Sri Lanka's canoodling couples. Not long after we entered the gardens we were approached by a man and two young boys. It transpired that he was an English teacher from a local school and that these were two of his pupils. They were hoping to have a conversation with some 'foreigners' in order to improve and practice their English they had learned in the past month. We spoke about the weather, our homes and out families. We're not sure if they were able to follow everything we said but they listened enthusiastically non the less. We also learned that bats aren't nocturnal, as they swooped and squawked from tree to tree, and that scorpions live in Sri Lanka. Smiling, a gardener held one up for us to see.

We made a last minute decision to go white water rafting and booked a night in one of the huts at Rafters Retreat in Kitulgala. With no windows and only three walls, the huts were wonderfully back to basics, completely made of wood and had a direct view over the rapids. We took a dip in the 'natural jacuzzi' before heading out on a jungle trek. As the jungle was on the other side of the river, we had to catch a 'ferry' to gain access. This was a very thin canoe with a large piece of bamboo attached parallel to it, acting as a counter balance to the passengers that stood sideways in it.

Once in the jungle, we were shown peppercorn trees, tea plants, frogs and insects. Our guide was determined to show us "a big, dangerous spider" which we can only assume was a tyranchilla. As he stuck a long stick into a nest in a tree, we were glad nothing emerged as it probably would have been pretty angry. Ashley was also introduced to the leeches, coming back with three bites.

Our hut for the night

The waterfall we found on our jungle trek.

The rafting itself was great fun and a perfect route for a couple of first timers. In a raft with 5 others, we took on rapids such as 'hat chopper' and 'butt clincher', paddling in whichever direction that the guy at the back of the boat told us to. We covered 5 rapids over the 7km route and at one point, just before a mild set of rapids, we were told to jump out of the raft into the cool, crystal clear water of the river. Lying on our backs, we flew through the set of rapids before floating down what must have been a 1km stretch of water. With the sun shining, it was idyllic and strangely relaxing. In fact, as we were standing for the whole bus journey back to Kandy, this was far more white-knuckle. As the driver accelerated, turned and braked hard, we held onto the bars as tightly as we could - one wrong move and we would have flown out of the open door and onto the road.

Back in Kandy, and with a breakfast of vegetable roti and samosa's in hand, we visited Labookellie tea factory. Judging by the long and steep drive, Labookellie must have been one of the highest tea plantations in the area, situated amongst the mist and clouds of the hills. We were taken on a tour of  the factory, where the tea was put through every process (from plucking to drying and oxidisation, when they add the various natural flavours - bergamot, vanilla, etc) within 24 hours, and even got a couple of cups at the end. All of this was free of charge! Richard was nearly wetting himself with excitement at the quantities of tea and associated paraphernalia available.

Plucking tea at the plantations in Labookellie

We did finally leave Kandy, moving further south to Dalhousie to climb the legendary Sri Pada, or Adam's Peak. Depending on your denomination, this is either where Adam, of Adam and Eve fame, took his first step on Earth, or where Buddha took his last before he became enlightened. Regardless, the walk to the top consists of scaling a vertical height of just under 2.3km, 5,500 steps and a round trip distance of 14km and is a pilgrimage undertaken by 100s of Buddhist each day.

The manger of our hostel, the fun to say Punsisi, was a friendly, funny guy who greeted us warmly. As we signed in, he asked Richard, "you do this?", making the actions of bicep curls and chest flyes. Laughing, he followed up with "I try this once and mine looked like the lady bits", cupping his hands to show imaginary boobs. He had won us over.

We set off at 2.30am in order to make sure we saw the sunrise and, as we ascended, we passed pilgrims from the very young (so young in fact that they were still unable to walk and so sat on Dad's shoulders) to the very old (we're talking well into their 70's and possibly 80's). Many didn't wear shoes and many more made do with flip-flops. Given the fact that it was the middle of the night, the heat was unreal and so profuse sweating was inevitable as we wound our way towards the top. Our route was lit, but it was difficult to see too far ahead or behind, which was probably a benefit as we didn't know how far we'd come or far we had to go.

At 5am, we reached the summit, where the air temperature had dropped considerably. We sat huddled together against a wall for warmth as we waited for sunrise. When it came, we quickly forgot about the the long, sweaty climb to the top as the sun illuminated spectacular panoramic views of the surrounding hills and the morning mists settled just below their peaks. We quickly remembered the journey, however, when we began the descent back down the stairs!

Our time in the hill country ended with an over night stay in Ella. We didn't have a hostel booked but, after our first victorious haggling session, we managed to get a room in the Ella Holiday Inn for 2,000Rs.

A pretty normal question in Sri Lanka is "which country are you from?" and the hostel manager at the Holiday Inn was no exception. However, when Richard answered England, the manager asked if he would be able to enlist our help with something. He explained further; the night before, a Lebanese couple had agreed in a room for the night at the prove of 6500Rs and this was to include breakfast (to the value of 700Rs) and dinner (to the value of 1000Rs). When it came to dinner, however, the couple ended up spending almost 4000Rs and, when presented with he bill the following morning, refused to pay any more than they agreed, despite their ridiculous overspend. As the manager explained why they needed to pay the additional cost, the woman threatened to beat him with her shoes, whilst the man grabbed him by the shirt and then the throat. The two of them left nothing more than the originally agreed amount  and the rest would be coming out of the managers wages. He asked if Richard could write an English letter to the Lebanese Tourist Board and Embassy explaining what had happened an he was happy to. He was even nice enough to give us a couple of free drinks as a result. It's ridiculous that someone could act so outrageously over what was about £15.

The next morning we did a cooking course at the hostel where we learned to make 7 dishes, including dhal, garlic curry, aubergine salad and chicken curry. We got a recipe book to take away and ate the dishes for lunch with rice and poppadoms.

On to the sun, sea and sand!

You should be able to see more photos by clicking here (fingers crossed)

The Cultural Triangle

We're still experiencing difficulties uploading photos so, for now, we will have to do our best to paint pictures with words (yes, that sentence is Richard's doing). Also, this is quite lengthy post, so brace yourself...

After our first stop on the cultural triangle, we reluctantly left the excellent Milano Tourist Rest in Anaradhapura and got on a bus to Dambulla. The bus was air conditioned and therefore a bit more upmarket than we have become used to. It's layout was quite strange, with two seats on one side, one on the other and one that folded down in the middle - you felt like you were sitting in a cinema. Despite it's plushness, it still only cost us 90Rs each - about 60p - for the 1 and a half hour trip.

Our hostel for the two nights was equally plush. MPS Village, although off the beaten track, was right on the edge of a lake surrounded by jungle and mountains. Dedicated travelers that we are, we were the only one of six couples that turned up to the retreat and so the staff took us on a tour of its grounds between rain showers. We saw their rice fields and fruit trees (mango, pineapple,papaya, coconut, banana and what may have been sharon fruit) all of which were used in its restaurant where we ate a dinner of 'sea fish' (tuna?) and vegetable noodles later that evening. For this we were originally sat outside, but after a bat flew over a couple of times and a small bird perched on the top of a lamp shat next to Ashley, we opted for the safety of inside. Don't get us wrong, it was a lovely place and very clean - it's just the price of being surrounding by what is essentially jungle. 

The two of us posing for an appropriately cheesey shot on our balcony at MPS Village

Our tuk-tuk (3-wheeler) driver for the following day was Kalu (Sri Lankan for black...) who took us to Sigiriya and Dambulla. Sigiriya is an ancient royal citadel, a world heritage site and apparently 1 hectare in size. It's grounds contain a series of water gardens fed by its own underwater channels, boulder gardens and fifth century cave paintings. The main event, however, was the lion staircase, which sat about halfway up the 1.5km rock formation. Today, all that remain are two enormous lion paws, which are part of what used to be a larger structure of a complete lion - you would ascend a staircase into its mouth and then into its throat.

At the top of a narrow set of stairs, which were steep, high and rickety enough to scare the crap out of Richard, lay the Kings palace. A sneaky tour guide had readied himself on these stairs just in front of us and as we approached we had no way of passing him. He therefore ended up walking us to the top. He did impart the fact that the King used to be carried up Sigiriyas 1,202 steps by four servants though, so we didn't begrudge the inevitable payment too much. As it was raining, some of the stairs on the ascent were like waterfalls - judging from the shocked and impressed expression of the hostel manager later that evening we did well to get to the top.

At the foot of the final climb to the top of Sigirya, between the lions paws

Kalu 'kindly' took us to a spice garden to see how everything from pepper and almonds to saffron and vanilla are grown. Our 'free' guide was even kind enough to show us how their saffron-based hair removal cream works right in the centre of Richards leg. He also offered it to Ashley! As they plied us with free cocoa drinks stirred with fresh vanilla pods, we smelt a sales pitch. We weren't wrong and at the end of the tour paid 2,500Rs (15 pound) for a 150ml pot of almond cream. We were annoyed at ourselves for not haggling on what was clearly a ridiculous price, but tried to focus on the positives - a half drunk cup of cocoa (we're still treading on egg shells with the water situation), an insight into how things we use daily grow and an enormous bald patch on Richards left leg.

The leg in question...

Dambulla was incredible and one of the highlights of Sri Lanka so far. The Rock Temple sat at the top of a lot of stairs, which Richard obviously enjoyed climbing (Ashley obviously did not). There were five caves temples, each with 10's of Buddhas inside that had been carved from the natural rock.This created a moody yet peaceful atmosphere added to by the somber face of Buddha and the lack of light in the room. As if this wasn't amazing enough, the walls and ceilings, which still had the natural undulations of natural rock, were adorned with bright and vibrant paintings. As this - like the other temples we had visited - was a place of worship, we had to remove our shoes. We actually enjoy the experience of walking around these places bare foot, but we thought it was a bit wrong that we were charged 25Rs for the pleasure. Maybe we were still getting over the Almond Cream Incident.

Stone-carved Buddhas and the painted ceilings of 1 of the 5 Rock Temples

We also visited The Golden Temple, a sort of Disney-esque dedication to Buddha, which, to be honest, was a bit shit.

Our third and final stop on The Cultural Triangle was Polonnaruwa for one night and one night only. For a change, we decided to explore the ruins on foot with the help of a map. Covering what must have been at least 6 miles over the course of an afternoon, we saw the remains of what was once a fortress city protecting the surrounding area from attacks from the Colas (said "cholas", aka South Indians).

We made our way back to the hostel with BBC (blisters, bites and chaffing), waving to the tuk-tuks, cars and motorbikes as they beeped and waved themselves. One minibus actually stopped and offered us a lift back into town. We are sure that the offer was genuine, but you never know and so we politely declined.

After dinner in our hostels dingy restaurant, we went back to our dingy room in the Gajaba Rest House and nested into pillow that felt like sacks of potatoes and smelt of old towel. Although we wouldn't recommend the Gajaba, the locals in Polonnaruwa were really friendly. As we waited for our bus to Kandy, we spoke to one guy who recommended a place to stay further into our journey and told us about his Russian girlfriend.

We're in Kandy now (and have been for 5 days) but will have to update you on that later!

x

The Beginning

After a 15 hour, 9,344km stint from Heathrow and through Dubai, we landed in Colombo at about 10am local time(4.30am UK time) on Wednesday 2nd February. We'd already booked 2 nights in The Hornbill Hostel, Colombo and so took a taxi from the airport which took about 1 hr and cost 2800 Sri Lanken Rupees (approx £18).

Once we'd arrived, we couldn't really sleep and so took the 40 minute bus ride into central Colombo. As we were operating on a maximum of 3 hours sleep, we were hugely jet lagged and so the experience of having countless vendors relentlessly hawk their various products (flip flops, sunglasses, bags, food...) under our noses was a lot to take in and a bit of a sensory overload. We managed to summon the energy to find a small 'hotel' (cafe) and have some dinner. Admittedly we were overly cautious and only had a couple of bakeries and a coke each, but it went down well. Exhausted, and slightly overwhelmed, we headed back for an early night.

Waking up the next morning, we wanted to head of the busy city of Colombo and chose to head across to Rambukkana for Pinnewala Elephant Orphanage, a 2 hour journey by train. This was our first experience with Sri Lanken trains, but it was a good one. There was no need for reading or listening to music as the train provides all the entertainment you need - from looking out the window and seeing vast jungles and women washing their clothes in one of the countless shanty towns we passed to the people on board selling everything from books and rubix cubes to corn on the cob and tea. Then there are those that are hanging out of the trains side doors and casually strolling along the tracks, acting blasé as a train hurtles past in the opposite direction inches from our face.

Pinnewala was amazing, incredible, fantastic. It was the Sri Lanka that we'd set out to see. Elephants of all shapes and sizes were roaming around right next to us as we watched them being fed. There were only 6 or 7 men controlling what must have been around 40 elephants with noises and sticks. About an hour into the visit, the elephant keepers started rounding up the elephants. As we stood behind a small wooden fence, the elephants were driven down a dirt path, out of the orphanage and through the streets of a small town before arriving at a river to wash.

A couple from the elephant orphanage - frustratingly, we can't get Richard the right way up.

The day held a number of lessons. The first was one the train, where in transpired that we had bought 3rd class tickets but were sat in the second class carriage. This was only because we had been ushered to our seats by a gentlemen who seemed very helpful and who assumed worked for railway. It turned out he was from the school for the deaf and expected money for his efforts (which he got, but was somewhat undeserved). Also, whilst we were watching the elephants wash, Richard was approached by what he thought was a restaurant manager trying to persuade us to eat at his establishment. After shaking Ashley's hand, he went to shake Richard's but as he extended it the man flipped it over and held Richard's wrist - he'd just been conned into a palm reading. Turns out he'll live until he is 97 and have a boy and a girl!

Later we had a chance to "make peace" with Colombo having a nice meal of vegetable rice, hopper's and parathi. It tasted good, but the enjoyment ended when Richard saw a rat scurry to the far corner of the room - bleurgh!

The next day was spent travelling to Anaradhapura, the first stop in the cultural triangle and our most northerly stop. It took 7 hours by train, 2 hours longer than scheduled, due to severe flooding in the region. This wasn't a problem but once you're on a train you have no idea if you're going in the right direction until you have reached your destination.

We had two nights booked at the Milano tourist rest, a 15 bed hostel with bar and restaurant giving it a lot more atmosphere than the Hornbill.

Today we hired a tuk-tuk with a driver/tour guide called Fernando who took us around Anaradhapura's ancient city, allowing us to take in several Buddhist temples and relics and ancient ruins (including a Buddhist monastery). His driving was amazing considering the majority of the roads were flooded. We also had the chance to see the effects of the floods. Apparently 1,000 families are now homeless with the flood waters reaching 3/4 foot in areas - some of them were pitched up at a dry side of the road. It was a really interesting, fact-filled and insightful day.

We were going to have some photos to accompany this post, but the internet connection on the  computer's here is telling us that it will take something ridiculous like an hour and ten minutes to get them up - we're paying by the minute so we'll hold fire for now and try again soon.

We're now off to enjoy a Sri Lankan beer and devilled dishes.

x


Update: we've managed to upload a few photos of the beginning of our trip from Ashley's camera. Click here to see them.