Travel update 2: In which Elizabeth ventures alone (sort of) into the central highlands of Sri Lanka

After a little time in Colombo, Zack had to head to Chennai in southern India for a few days. I was dead set on getting some good hiking in on this trip, so I hopped on a train bound for the central highlands, planning to spend a few days wandering around Nuwara Eliya and Ella.

Getting to Nuwara Eliya

I rarely travel alone, and while I do like being by myself, I always worry that traveling alone will make me feel really lonely. Imagine my delight, then, when I ended up on the train to Nuwara Eliya sitting next to Stephanie, a lovely lady from Hong Kong. We were in the observation carriage at the back of the train, a great spot for stunning mountain views on the seven-hour train ride. We got to talking and found that we were both headed to the same area for the sole purpose of hiking our faces off and drowning ourselves in Ceylon tea. I hadn’t booked a hotel yet, so Stephanie invited me to stay with her. As the train snaked its way slowly into the mountains, we began formulating plans for our time in Nuwara Eliya (and taking an absurd number of pictures from the train window). Here’s a little train view collage:

We got into Nuwara Eliya in the late afternoon. As the sun went down it started to get COLD! I haven’t been in cold weather in like two years, so I was wholly unprepared for how chilly it got overnight up in the Sri Lankan mountains, although I guess I should have known considering the elevation is 1868 m, or 6128 ft. When Stephanie and I went into town to grab dinner, I stopped off in a little shop to get a sweater as well. This proved to be a very important purchase the following morning.

Also, here's the view of Lake Gregory from our hotel (sorry, I procrastinated too long and now can't remember the name of it) and a picture of Stephanie pouring us a tasty cup of Ceylon tea:

Horton Plains National Park

I was only in Nuwara Eliya for one day, and I knew I wanted to hike to World’s End in Horton Plains National Park. It’s over an hour’s drive to Horton Plains, so Stephanie and I arranged for the man who drove us from the train station to our hotel to take us to the park as well. He picked us up super early in the morning (it was freezing, and I was very glad for the sweater I’d bought the night before). The hike wasn’t super challenging or anything, but it was incredibly beautiful. World’s End had a fantastic view, and the trek back out to the park entrance was through a really interesting alpine plain. We also stopped off at lovely Baker’s Falls on our way out.

Sunrise over the cloud forest

Panoramic view of World's End

A little deer friend

Also Baker's Falls

That afternoon, we went to two tea plantations and I spent an ungodly amount of money buying every kind of tea that looked interesting to me. We went to Mackwoods for a tour of their tea factory and then to Bluefield to buy tea. 

On to Ella

Stephanie stuck around in Nuwara Eliya for another day, but I had only a short time in the central highlands so I was keen to get to my next destination, a charming mountain town called Ella. I took the train from Nuwara Eliya to Ella, which took about four hours and featured even more stunning views than the trip from Colombo to Nuwara Eliya. 

I’m kind of a plan-as-you-go traveler, so I booked my hotel in Ella the night before I left (on trusty agoda.com). I got super lucky - Ella’s Edge has an incredible view of the surrounding mountains, the breakfast is gigantic and fabulous and it’s located in a quiet spot just a short walk from the city center.  Here's the afternoon and sunrise view:

There are a couple of good hikes around Ella that I wanted to check out. I decided to start with Ella Rock. Looking on tripadvisor, I found that the trek up to Ella Rock is not particularly well-marked, and that if you go alone guides will try to get you to hire them along the way. A guy at my hotel made me a fairly hilarious hand-drawn “map”, and I’m pretty comfortable getting lost so I figured I would be fine, but I didn’t count on the fact that a woman hiking alone is a super easy target for aggressively “helpful” guides. They do this thing where they talk you into going the wrong way, and then follow you for a while and tell you they’ll “help” you get back on track - for a small fee, of course. I am very embarrassed to say that this happened to me twice (in my defense, the second one was incredibly persuasive, convincing and difficult to shake), and by the time I got to Ella Rock I was feeling disempowered, frustrated and cranky. I shook off the second guide and wandered through a lovely forest over to a cliffside shrine next to this pretty overlook far away from the other tourists. And that’s when the real adventure started. But first, here are some pictures.

Don’t go chasin’ waterfalls, y’all

I was just about to walk back over to the main trail to get back to Ella when I ran into these two super lovely Czech guys, Petr and Karel. They were planning to try to hike down to the bottom of Ravana Falls to go for a swim. I was feeling a little cheated of my own hiking adventure for the day, and definitely not keen to get waylaid by yet another overly solicitous guide, so I asked if I could tag along. Petr told me we would likely be going pretty far off the trail and that there was a chance we wouldn’t even make it to the waterfall. Feeling reckless, I was like, “Awesome let’s go.”

Thus began an epic, hours-long trek down a steep mountainside, first through dense brush and eventually through dusty, ashy, burned-out fields. All three of us scrambled along, occasionally tripping and sliding. A rock hit the back of Karel’s ankle and he started bleeding profusely. Petr cut his hand. We were totally covered in thick, black ash. Ultimately, we realized that we just weren’t going to make it to that waterfall without breaking ourselves and we had to climb all the way back up again. Nevertheless, this was seriously the most fun and memorable day of my trip.

I’d planned to be out for about four hours. With our failed waterfall detour, we ended up being out for about seven hours. Needless to say, I didn’t feel so bad about skipping runs that week, and I had like 32,000 steps on my Fitbit that day.

Gross.

Other things in Ella

After our big day, Petr invited me to join him and Karel for dinner at a guesthouse he had stayed at previously. This lovely old Sri Lankan lady fixed us an epic feast and we ate our faces off. Then we headed down to a little bar around the corner and drank FAR too much Arrack, a local liquor, and Tiger Black (which, incidentally, I would recommend that no one else ever drink EVER… you’ve been warned). The bar itself was hilarious, particularly the majestic lion mural on the wall.

The next morning I was supposed to meet up with Stephanie, who had since made it from Nuwara Eliya to Ella, to hike Little Adam’s Peak for sunrise, but I overslept :/ (possibly due to the aforementioned tragic Tiger Black and Arrack combo). Luckily, we were able to meet up later to walk down the train tracks a few kilometers to Nine Arches and a cute little tea shop.

That afternoon, I hired a car and driver to take me down to Galle to meet up with Zack. There is a bus, but I would have had to leave quite early that morning and I didn’t want to miss my last day in Ella. The private car cost about LRK 10,000 (~USD 65) and only took about five hours - totally worth it to me for the flexibility and napping potential. And thus ended my Sri Lankan mountain adventures! I’ll be back soon with a post on lovely Galle and the reunification of Zack and Elizabeth!