Read only if you really really LOVE tea

..you might want to put the kettle on...

 Ella is a wonderful little village in the hill country surrounded by tea plantations. The weather is sunny but not too hot, the vista in every direction makes you feel small in the good way (yes- looking for original ways to say 'nice view') and the only minor drawback is that they seem to have a bit of a fly problem. Or maybe that was just me after 3 weeks of backpacking...
Tea is huge in Sri Lanka and most of it is grown here in the hills where the temperatures are a little cooler.

The land of rolling tea plantations

We visited the Uva Halpewatte tea factory for a tour to learn more...

Each plantation, and all the plantation workers, are run independently by farm managers and the factories have no influence. The manager sets the no. of kilos the workers must pick each day to earn their salary, based on a visual survey of how much looks harvestable that morning. 

The tea pickers choose the younger leaves from the top of the tea bush as these give the highest quality. Machines were once tested to pick the leaves but results were poor as the best way to identify these younger softer leaves is through human touch. Most people in this area are employed through the tea industry, which employs over 1 million people, directly & indirectly, throughout Sri Lanka, and has played a key role in the country's development.

The leaves are at the factory day after being picked. They are then spread out to dry at air temperature for 12-15 hours losing 45% of their weight & moisture. Next, the leaves are put through machines called 'rollers' which break down the cell structures in the leaves to initiate the chemical processes which create the strength, flavour, quality etc... There are 4 rollers each taking 20-30 minutes. Some leaves are sieved and removed after roller 1 (highest quality) and the rest goes through roller 2 and so on until roller 4 is left with only stalks and tougher older leaves. This residue is used as fertiliser and to make the poorer quality cheaper tea that is sold in Sri Lanka. 95% of tea grown here is exported.

The broken down leaves are then left out to ferment and oxidise for 2-3 hours. After this they are fired to cease oxidation and fully remove the moisture.Now it is ready for packaging according to different grades based on size of the broken leaf which depends on which roller it came out of. Still following?!

We got to taste 4 different grades, the stronger end goes into English breakfast tea and the higher quality more refined flavour is for more speciality teas, apparently more suited to the afternoon dahling. This factory only produces black tea. All other tea comes from exactly the same plant but is just processed differently. 

The whole process from plant to packaging takes only 24-36 hours. Samples are sent to tea brokers, of which there are only 8 in Sri Lanka. These tea experts will taste and value the tea (as each crop obviously has variations) and then sell at a physical auction to tea magnates from around the world. The consistent flavour we find in most of our famous tea brands come from their method of blending lots of different teas from different places. So it's very unlikely you would drink tea only made in Sri Lanka.

What's particularly interesting is the way that the technology and method of distribution has changed so little over the last century. They seem very proud of these methods. The only modern additions to the factory are electronic scales and some air humidifiers.

Phew. After learning all we could about tea we climbed Little Adams Peak, named after the larger and more famous Adams Peak further West in the hill country, a pilgrimage site where Adam is said to have first set foot on Earth after being cast out of heaven, also know as Sri Pada, the sacred footprint left by the Buddha as he headed toward paradise. It's little sister was not too little and presented us with beautiful views of surrounding hills and waterfalls.

We passed this exclusive and isolated set of holiday homes en route...

...shortly before finding the helipad that serves these ridiculously nice cottages

Useful sign at the top of another nearby peak

The lovely Ruwana Falls

We managed to hitch a ride in a real life air conditioned car down to the South coast as a driver had just dropped someone off in Ella and had to go back down but wanted to make a few bob along the way if he could. So compared to 113km for £25 in a tuk-tuk, 180km in a car for £12 was pure affordable luxury. We're not getting lazy, just making sure to sample all forms of transport available in Sri Lanka yah?

stopping off for a short-eat

Nuwara Eliyah

I know how much you've all been enjoying Millie's writing in previous posts, so I'm sorry to deprive you of that on this occasion. However, it's only fair that I chip in every now and then (that's the official party line, truth is that Millie doesn't trust me with it!) 

Leaving Kandy, we were treated to a stunning train ride up into the hill country. 

The train barely got above 20kmph at any time, giving us plenty of time to enjoy the views. Obviously, being slow tourists, we missed the chance of getting seats, so we spent most of the 5 hour ride stood by the door, getting very wet! 

Following the journey, we stopped in Nuwara Eliya - a town dubbed "Little England" for its colonial architecture, tea plantations and terrible weather (constant rain!) What you do get there though, is incredible views accross to the tea plantation workers' colourful villages, and great views down the valleys to the lakes.

 

Some of the houses look like they're straight out of Herefordshire..

After the debacle surrounding our cycling endeavours in Anuradhapura, I took myself off on a mountain bike finding some more stunning scenery (sensing a pattern here yet?!) and inadvertently discovering that tea plantations create some brilliant downhill tracks. 

Sweaty man.

My "solid" mountain bike for the day. 

One of many villages created by tea workers.

Tea! Everywhere!

It also seems the tea plantations like to encourage sustainable attitudes to looking after the hillsides around them...

...and some of the hillside restaurants aren't quite so welcoming! 

The next day we had a 5am start to catch views at World's End in the Horton Plains National Park before the clouds roll in. The walk through the plains was dotted with pockets of forest which were covered in thousands of beautiful purple "nelu" flowers - we were very fortunate in our timing as these only flower every 8 years! 

The path then emerges to a stunning viewpoint (World's End) which is on top of a cliff face with a drop below of over 800m. 

Views for miles - on a clear day you can see right to the coast.

Not remotely nervous about falling off...honest...

Once we had eaten our breakfast at the viewpoint, and resisted the urge to push each other off the side, we moved on further into the park via beautiful waterfalls, winding rivers and yet more great views across the plains.

A "Millie-pede"...

We then had a wait of over 3 hours for our train to Ella (yes we sang the Rihanna song too) however that's hard to complain about when the station was such a lovely spot to pass time in. 

Next time you'll be back in Millie's capable hands!

Buddha's tooth & tropical gardens in Kandy

Kandy is a very special place for Sri Lankans, being the ancient capital, second city, and home to Buddha's Sacred Tooth Relic. It is quite a holy place, and the local nightclubs mentioned in the Lonely Planet guide have been closed down in the last year in efforts to retain the city's spiritual focus. At first it was exciting to be back in a city, but after a few days, having had enough of the smog, we escaped to the hills.

Before we left...

We met a couple of guys at 'Slightly Chilled' bar overlooking Kandy Lake and discussed the Dharma

Saw some traditional Kandyan dancing, which included walking on hot coals. The dancers that is.

My mum made an appearance.. (sorry Sal)

We had a gander at a pelican sitting on Kandy Lake

Visited the Royal Palace Park...

 Rich had a swing

This fountain was pretty

Hung out with some baby monkeys 

We visited the main attraction in Kandy, the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, to see the shrine holding the sacred tooth. It is a beautiful place to walk, worship and learn about Buddhism.

We viewed the Temple from across Kandy Lake

The inside was decorated with statues of the Buddha and told the story of how the tooth came to be in Kandy

The International Buddhist Museum was fantastic, with each room dedicated to the history of Buddhism from every Buddhist country around the world

We also had a stroll around the Peradeniya Botanical Gardens just outside of Kandy. This amazing collection of flora from all around the tropics includes an arboretum, spice garden and herbarium.

The 60ha gardens in a loop of the Mahweli Ganga have some amazing palm lined avenues - my favourite photo of Sri Lanka so far

The cannonball tree has fruit up to 25cm wide

The young shoots of Burmese Giant Bamboo can grow up to a foot a day

  

A giant Javan fig covers 2,500 square metres on the Great Lawn

This tree has a funky shape

This isn't a tree

Next we take an epic train journey deeper into the Sri Lankan hill country...

It's elephant time!

From Sigiriya, we took a safari to Minneriya National Park which was fantastic. As well as an array birds and lizards, the highlight was, of course, the herds of elephants who gather around Minneriya lake. I had no idea that the safari jeeps would be able to get so close  to the elephants themselves, so it was an incredible surprise to be watching baby elephants from only two metres away. However, the proximity did make it more difficult to think of them as wild, which of course they are, but well accustomed to human presence. This must also have some bearing on the human-elephant conflict that Sri Lankan authorities struggle with.

 

To be completely honest, and I know it's probably sacrilege or something, once you've stared at a herd of elephants grazing for half an hour it kiiind of feels like staring at a herd of grazing cattle. I think it helped that the lake landscape itself was so beautiful as there was still plenty to gawp at in between watching elephants pull up grass with their trunks. I'm sorry if I've just upset some people.

On the way we were told about an elephant called 'Earhole' due the to holes in her ears... She apparently lost her calf a couple of years ago due to an incident with a jeep. Since then, she will sometimes lose her temper and charge at the safari jeeps. Having been told this we assumed that the drivers would give her a wide berth but what actually happened was that the jeeps stayed fairly close until she inevitably lost her temper and charged. The jeep drove off and everyone was fine, except for this poor elephant who was clearly distressed and the guides seemed to find it amusing, which wasn't very nice.

We were joined on the safari by a Swiss psychologist called Fabien who works with addicts in Zurich and was staying in the room next door to us at the guesthouse. After the safari we had a few beers together- although still in bed by the 10pm curfew! So far in Sri Lanka, everyone goes to bed early and it definitely isn't the norm to stay up late drinking. Although I have a feeling that may change as we move toward the more touristic south of the island.

As well as elephants we got to see another water monitor, a chameleon, a family of grey langur, and plenty of exotic birds including wild peacocks, bee-eaters, Asian Openbill, painted stork, wooly-necked stork, lesser adjutant, black-headed ibis, pelicans, black-breasted snake eagle and cattle egret who hang around to eat the insects off the elephants.

And here are some of the elephant facts we learned:

1. Their skin is 10% of their body weight and around 1.5inches thick

2. Only Asian elephant males have ivory (as opposed to both sexes in African elephants) and even then, only around 3% develop tusks

3. You can work out the height of an elephant from the diameter of its foot - 4 x pie x the radius gives you the height in inches!