Tamanawila to Ahangama, Sri Lanka

The next day we bicycled some 50 km to a hotel in the small town Ahangama near Galle along the southern coast of Sri Lanka. We spent two days there, enjoying the pool and ocean at the hotel, and went whale watching early one morning, where we observed blue whales and a school of porpoises. We then headed to Colombo, stopping for a brief break to see the historic downtown fortress in Galle, built by the Dutch and British. We arrived in late afternoon for our final stay at a hotel in Colombo.

Tamanawila and Yala National Park, Sri Lanka

Today we got up early to take a safari trip into the adjoining Yala National Park.
We had a rich morning of sightings, a leopard mother and her cubs (though heavily camouflaged in the brush), plenty of peacocks and crocodiles, wild pigs, deer, and various species of birds. We also visited a site along the ocean that had been devastated by the tsunami of several years ago. Some forty tourists staying at a seaside park lodge there perished in the disaster. Only the foundation of the building remained.

In the afternoon we bicycled to the Kataragama Buddhist sanctuary, a pilgrimage site for worshipers suffering from health problems. We walked around the vast grounds and observed the food sacrifices that the faithful offered the Buddha in hopes of restorative health.

Ella to Tamanawila, Sri Lanka

Today was our most ambitious bicycle day, a 102 km slog towards the southern coast.
Fortunately, the initial part of the trip was a long descent and the remaining part
of the trip was over flat terrain or rolling hills. We again experienced several rain storms in route, but were prepared with rain gear or a willingness to become completely soaked. Fortunately, one becomes quickly dried in the hot tropical climate once the rain subsides. We took the long journey in short 15 or 20 km segments, stopping for tea or lunch several times throughout the day. We took a short detour during the day to see the Budhhavirgala Buddhist images carved on a cliff in the jungle, dating back some 1100 years. We reached our destination, an upscale hotel with a pool, and settled into a 2 days layover.

Nuwara Ellya to Ella, Sri Lanka

We had a hard bicycling day, after visiting a tea plantation outside Nuwara Ellya.
We toured their processing plant, seeing how the leaves were dried, curled, cut,
ground, and filtered into different varieties of tea. We discovered that the women
who do the back breaking work of picking the tea leaves from the plants work 8 hours a day for 6 days a week, making $3.80 USD per day. The daughter of one of the pickers was our guide through the plant and she said she was glad to not have to be doing the work of her mother.

We had a wonderful scenic 35 km ride downhill for the first part of our day's bicycle
ride, then went an additional 35 km along rolling hills to our destination, encountering several violent rainstorms along the way. Ella is a popular tourist destination and some of us resorted to hamburgers for supper, feeling some pangs of
homesickness for familiar food.

Kandy to Nuwara Ellya, Sri Lanka

The next day we took the train from Kandy to the mountaintop town of Nuwara Ellya, famous for its cool weather and tea plantations first developed by the British during colonization days. The train was quite basic but interesting as it climbed up steep hillsides to reach the highest point in Sri Lanka. We stayed at a classic old British hotel, the Hill Club, once frequented by British tea planters, with its dark hallways, high ceilings, lounging room, bar, and dining room. Coat and tie are still required for the main dining room supper, but we opted otherwise and ate in a less former venue in the hotel, enjoying a 5 course British meal.

Kandy, Sri Lanka

We spent a rest day in Kandy, situated on a lake at a higher elevation with a cooler climate than the hot coastal regions. Kandy had been the capital city of the Sri Lanka Sinhalese when the British colonized the area. They promptly moved the capital to the coastal Colombo where there was more economic activity. We stayed in an upscale hotel situated on a hill overlooking the city. I spent the day visiting tourist sites: the large beautiful well maintained botanical gardens located outside the city where I saw many different species of tropical trees and plants, a greenhouse with orchids, many nurseries of large bats hanging from the branches of trees, and a large snake slithering across the path ahead of me; a dancing event with many of the traditional Sri Lankan native dances including fire walking, and the Buddhist Temple that reputes to house one of Buddha’s teeth.

Polonnaruwa to Kandy, Sri Lanka

We bicycled two days to reach Candy from Polonnaruwa, with rides of 80 and 50 km. In the heat of Sri Lanka, with some elevational increases, both days were a challenge. We took a spice tour at our first night’s lodging at Nalanda. We were glad to arrive in Candy for a two day layover, time to visit sights in that city and do our laundry.