Nurawa Eliya and Ramboda

Tuesday 10th June 2003. Ambiente Guest House, Ella
We were woken at 5.30 this morning by the chanting of the Temple monks in the valley. Apparently there are only three of them but the sound reverberated around the hills and continued until the sun burst over the hilltop in a flood of bright light around 6am.

We are now on our balcony with the sound of birds and the distant tumbling of the waterfall. We’ve said goodbye once again to Bruno and Andrea who have gone off to take the train up the valley to Badulla for the day. They are enjoying it here so much they have decided to stay another night. We’ll be leaving shortly but we wish that our stay here could have been longer. The garden is quite English with sweet smelling roses, geraniums, salvias and chrysanthemums. It’s nice to feel comfortable again although it will probably get a lot hotter later. This early in the day it feels like a perfect summer’s day in England.

I forgot to mention yesterday that Lionel took us through a rubber plantation where we saw grooves cut into the bark of each trunk with little coconut shell containers at the bottom into which the white latex sap trickled. A man was going round emptying these. Each tree is visited daily. We’ve seen a rubber factory from a distance but haven’t found out about the treatment process. Synthetic rubbers must have greatly reduced the need for the real stuff.

10th June continued. Ramboda Falls
We descended from our high eyrie at Ella through little villages, vegetable plots, terraced paddy fields and bright green tea plantations where the women were already collecting the tips and placing them in sacks or baskets tied to the back of their heads. Lionel told us that 80% of the population in the area is Tamil and they live peacefully, side by side with the Sinhalese population. We saw a number of Hindu temples which are very ornate and colourful, the tall entrances crowded with statues of the Hindu Gods. Road and shop signs tend to be in three languages – Tamil, Sinhala and English. Generally education is separate with Tamil children going to their own schools. Lionel also told us that 95% of the population in this area live off the land, producing all their own rice and vegetables. The land is very fertile and has considerably more rain each year than we do in Devon. Fruit trees grow wild so there is always a plentiful supply of fresh fruit. Today we have recognised jack fruit, avocados, mangoes, papayas, bananas, pineapples, durians and bread fruit.

Our route today took us through wonderful scenery with the mountains verdant to their very summits, which were frequently lost in a shroud of white mist. How can two such different places exist in a small island? The contrast in scenery, climate and social wellbeing between the shanty-town dwellers of the flat, humid west coast and the self-sufficient farming communities of the temperate highlands could not be more marked. To some extent the cultural differences between the Tamils and Sinhalese may be an influencing factor and the Tamils certainly have a well deserved reputation for working hard.

As the road climbed higher the hills became covered in Scots pines, and rice largely disappeared to be replaced by immaculate terraces of leeks - a sight and smell associated in our minds with wintertime in Britain and therefore quite unexpected in a tropical island just north of the Equator! The climate became more temperate and acres of carrots, cabbages, onions, runner beans, tomatoes, beetroot and radishes began to appear. The main crop however was definitely leeks. It is here that the vegetables found on the market stalls in Colombo and the other major towns are cultivated. Tea was also much in evidence. High-grown tea is considered the best.

Eventually we reached the highest town in Sri Lanka, Nurawa Eliya. Lake Gregory, a large lake covered in pretty water lilies, was edged along one side by endless allotments with the green mountains behind whilst the other side was skirted by a big grassy area with huge, expensive houses that would not look out of place in the Home Counties.


Lake Gregory, Nurawa Eliya. Terraces of leeks and vegetables.

When we got out of the car the air felt cool and fresh, like an English summer's day. Lionel shivered as we gasped with delight, feeling comfortable at last! In colonial times, it is small wonder that British families, confined to the heat of Colombo, seized every opportunity to escape to the hills and enjoy a more temperate and familiar climate. The area is known as Little England and the building style reflects this. It is however, building on a grand scale. There was, and still is, a lot of money somewhere in Sri Lanka for people to afford to live or own property in Nurawa Eliya.

Victoriya Park - as they spell it here – is a quintessentially British park placed down on the roof of Sri Lanka. A lake with water lilies and fishes is set beside a rockery and shrubbery. A bright green lawn has a broad pathway winding through it edged with neat flowerbeds of begonias, geraniums, petunias, salvias, snapdragons and marigolds. Avenues of trees, rose gardens, a well equipped children’s playground and a park kiosk selling hot coffee and tea complete the amazing relocation of a typically English municipal park!


Victoriya Park with a polite notice in three languages!

Lionel drove us up past the Golf Club with its sandy bunkers and green grassy links – it’s considered to be the best in Asia – and up the drive to the entrance of the Grand Hotel. Before we could protest the car door was opened by a doorman in a white and gold uniform who ushered us into the entrance whilst Lionel drove off and left us to the mercy of the management.

We were given an escorted tour of the hotel – nearly empty on this bright, sunny, off- season day but often accommodating 200 guests at £170 per room per night! The furniture is Victorian, the walls dark-panelled with crystal chandeliers. Ian succeeded in getting us into our escort’s good books by recognising a clock as being by Seth Thomas and accurately dating the manufacture of the two massive billiard tables.

We were then offered coffee on the lawns in front of the Grand Hotel, bordered by pretty rose bushes and beds of bright summer flowers. Magnificent fir trees offered spots of welcome shade for although the air was fresher here, the sun was as glaringly bright as ever. We found Lionel and persuaded him to join us. His reserve gradually evaporated as the temptation to take coffee as our guest at the most famous old hotel in the country took a hold of him! He relaxed completely when I pocketed some monogrammed sugar to show off with when we get home. He found it quite amusing and I think he was pleased to realise that it was all rather an experience for us too.


Taking coffee on the lawn of the Grand Hotel. The President's house.


The Post Office

By this time we were feeling like the elite. Leaving the car outside the hotel we strolled past the President’s private residence and similar establishments set in beautiful English gardens, to the centre of the town where the ordinary folk went about their daily business of buying and selling sacks of rice, chillies, dried fish and healthy looking vegetables. The temperature was perfect for strolling around. The town was clean and generally seemed well cared for and prosperous. There was no litter and the streets had been recently swept. Nobody hassled us or paid us any particular attention at all. It was such a nice feeling not to be stared at, pestered, followed or begged from. If this had been my first impression of the country I would have thought myself in a prosperous and beautiful land and would have been unable to recognise it as a third-World country. It really is hard to realise that it is the same country that has people living under torn plastic sheeting on the railway track outside of Galle without piped water or sanitation.

However, in the hillside villages outside Nurawa Eliya most people do not have access to piped water either. There are streams and waterfalls everywhere but access to water is at the village fountain or well. It is the social heart of the village where women gather to bathe, wash clothes and fill water containers that then have to be carried back to their homes. Women have the task of collecting water, and frequently the rice as well. We saw one really old lady struggling up a hill in the heat carrying a sack of rice.

In the centre of Nurawa Eliya is Cargills. This was where the British would shop in the past and even today it is still too exclusive for most ordinary residents to use. I needed some more ink cartridges for this diary. We waited ages to be served. There were several staff who were doing nothing with admirable efficiency and when we were eventually served it took three of them to tell me they didn’t sell ink cartridges. They even showed me a packet to prove they knew what I wanted and that they hadn’t got any! I asked “What is this then? Can I buy it?” No, I was told, it’s only to be sold with a Parker pen! The pen cost 1800 rupees! “What happens when the ink runs out?” I asked. “Can you buy a refill or do you have to buy a new pen?” Such a though never seems to have been considered, but then the pens looked as if they had probably been there for many years. They were far too expensive for most local people to afford. Eventually, after much discussion, disappearing to speak to the management and filling in of receipts in triplicate, I was permitted to purchase a tatty ballpoint pen for 16 rupees. Even then, for some reason that I never fathomed, I couldn’t have the blue one, only the black one! So this diary will have to be finished in black biro once this cartridge runs out.

Being on foot rather than driving, Lionel confessed that he was lost and didn’t know the way back to the car. He thinks we are really cool now as we told him to place his trust in us and we’d see him and his car safely reunited. This we did with no difficulty having seen a sign for the Grand Hotel which we followed without pointing it out to Lionel! As a reward we were driven to the Labookellie tea plantation where we were given a guided tour. It wasn’t as friendly or as nice as the one we went to with Susantha but, thanks to that, this time we could talk knowledgeably about tea auctions in Colombo and the main purchasers being the Russians and the Iranians. We had tea in the tasting room. Lionel told us it was B.O.P. tea. This floored us so he got his revenge for us teasing him earlier. (Broken Orange Peko.)

Stopping regularly to take photos we drove down to a lower level and into the cloud cover so we were twisting down through endless tea plantations in a thick, swirling mist. Ideal for the many ladies plucking away for PG Tips I imagine. It must be unpleasant to have to work from 8.30am until 5pm in the heat, unsheltered, on a very steep hillside, bent over low bushes with a huge basket or sack strapped to your head.


Labookellie tea factory. Tamil tea pickers.

We paused to photograph a waterfall. When we came back Lionel had bought us each a banana from a young man sitting by the roadside with a bunch of them on the off -chance we’d be passing!

As we twisted down bend after bend a child jumped into the road trying to sell us a bunch of flowers. We drove on past, but at the next bend there he was again! And again at the next, and the one after that! He simply jumped straight down the hillside from level to level waiting for us to reappear after navigating the bends! We felt rather rotten that he’d have to climb all the way back up again to try it on the next car to go past but we had absolutely no use whatever for a bunch of marigolds!

We reached the Ramboda Falls, where a couple of separate waterfalls crash down from the rocks high above us into the boulder-strewn river below. Here we are to spend the night in a hotel built on several levels, cut into the steep hillside. There seem to be steps everywhere. The hotel is sited below the road so from there one is barely conscious of it existence. The balcony of our room looks directly out onto the falls. We are so close that the sound of the water is really loud. I hope we’ll manage to sleep okay!


Ramboda Falls Jill and Lionel take a stroll


Ramboda Falls Relaxing on the terrace One of many uninvited guests.

We have wonderful views from our room again today. We also have an avocado pear tree growing so close to our balcony we can lean over and touch the fruit. For entertainment we have a monkey cabaret. They climb onto the balcony railing and sit there eating avocados and mangoes. They perform acrobatics, leaping through the branches of the trees. They also sit on the edge of the balcony above us and pee over the edge so that it cascades down to form puddles on our balcony!

Having settled in we tried to climb down a rocky track through the grounds to the foot of the falls. Lionel came too, having decided we are okay and that it wasn’t necessary to hide himself away. We found really huge wood lice, the size of a small mouse, and Ian panicked when a leech took a liking to his left ankle. Lionel thought this amusing and helped to remove it before it got properly stuck on. We found a chameleon and saw various brightly coloured birds including woodpeckers, yellow orioles and green parrots.

An hour or two later, as dusk fell, we returned to the hotel and left Lionel. We took showers and, while our supper was being prepared, we sat with a Lion beer on the terrace in the noisy darkness with the crashing of the waterfall and the sounds of frogs and cicadas. We are the only guests so were personally attended by a liberal number of waiters. The menu was rather limited – like only one of the four choices was available – but it was fine and the staff are really very friendly. They think it amusing that we try to use odd words in Sinhala. They taught us to say “good night”. This proved really useful when we encountered Lionel again as we crossed the garden in the dark, lit only by fireflies, on our way back to our apartment. He was greatly amused when we cheerily wished him good night in Sinhala! (We’ve forgotten it already.)