Sri Lanka - Pearl of the Indian Ocean

Travelogue 29

“Sri Lanka has it all – a balmy tropical climate, dramatic sandy beaches backed by lush deep green forests that sway to the sound of bird song, high-altitude hill-top hideaways, a diverse array of wildlife and traditional working tea plantations.”

 - Anon

 

Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage,
largest herd of captive elephants in the world

Bestowed with nature’s bounty in a tropical setting, with lush green tea gardens in inviting mountainous terrain, and golden beaches dotting its coastline, the island nation of Sri Lanka, India’s southern neighbor, has been a tourist’s delight until recently.  Tourism has contributed significantly to the country’s economy after the long civil war (1983 - 2009).  But Sri Lanka has seen a huge setback to international tourism since 2019 due to terrorist attacks that year, followed by the Covid 19 crisis and, more recently, political disturbances within the country triggered by an economic crisis.  Since then, there appears to be a slow revival.

Gaining independence in 1948, soon after India's, with a population of 22 million and a diverse cultural history, Sri Lanka is often described as the Pearl of the Indian Ocean.

Having teamed up previously in visits to Dubai and Abu Dabhi, two jewels in the Arabian Desert, and Ancient Egypt, home to the greatest wonder of the world, my good friend and colleague Dr C Seshadri (referred to as CS in the rest of this article) and I decided to add the pearl of the Indian Ocean to our collection to complete a hat-trick.  As before with the Egypt tour, we joined a small group of tourists from Bangalore on a leisurely five-day trip organized by the same tourist agency.

Our travel itinerary included a number of tourist attractions in central and western coastal regions of the island as marked out in the map below: 

Our flight reached Colombo on the night of 23 Feb 18.  After airport formalities we were driven to a seaside resort north of the airport.  The de facto leader of our group was a very talented and easy-going ex-cricketer who had the rare distinction of having played for both Karnataka and Tamil Nādu at the state level as an opening batsman, and spoke both the languages fluently. As a bit of an ex-cricketer myself, having once played for my school as a twelfth man, I easily formed a bond with him, the big difference in age and ability notwithstanding! He was travelling with his wife and three other close relatives, forming a sub-group of their own. 

The places circled in the map above correspond successively to: (1) Arrival at Colombo Airport, (2) Negombo tourist resort, (3) Pinnawala Elephant Sanctuary, (4) Medicinal plant farm near Kurunegala, (5) Buddha’s Tooth Relic at Kandy, and stay at Grand Mountain Hotel at Matale, (6) Royal Botanical Gardens at Peradenia, (7) Nuwara Eliya, (8) Waskaduwa Citrus Resort, (9) Madu River Safari, (10) Induruwa Turtle Hatchery, and (11) Colombo city.

Negombo Resort

Negombo is a city on the west coast of Sri Lanka and north of the only international airport near Colombo. It is generally where tourists are headed upon arrival in the country, and for this reason, boasts of a large number of coastal resorts and hotels.  We stayed overnight in one such resort.  When I woke up early next morning here is a picture of what I saw of the resort in early morning light:

Before going for breakfast, I took a picture of the entrance to the resort and the greenery around it in the early morning sunlight, and unwittingly I had captured my own shadow (see below) in the very process of clicking, with CS standing by my side and looking at me, perhaps perplexed if not annoyed. 

We all spent some time relaxing and roaming around at the dense sandy beach close to the resort before heading for breakfast. We then boarded our bus for one of the major attractions of the tour, about two hours journey eastward.

Pinnewala Elephant Sanctuary

Pinnewala Elephant Sanctuary is a captive breeding and conservation facility for wild orphaned elephants located at Pinnawala village, about 15 km away from Kegalle town in central Sri Lanka. It has the largest herd of captive elephants in the world, with 71 from three generations at the time of our visit.  In 2021, there was the rare instance of a 25-year-old elephant giving birth to twin male baby elephants at the orphanage.

The main residential care area is on the east side of a highway. The elephant bathing and visitors’ viewing area is along the Oya River directly opposite on the west side of the highway.

Here is a group of elephants moving around freely in the residential area: 

Every morning, coinciding with peak tourist arrivals at the spot, most of the elephants are ceremonially escorted across the road by mahouts (elephant handlers) to the river area, which has an impressive observation facility-cum-restaurant for visitors. We were shown this fairly long-drawn-out ceremony and then taken to our vantage points in the building to witness the elephants play merrily even as they would be cleaned up in the river.

Here is a close-up picture of a big elephant led across by two mahouts, one riding it on top and the other guiding it from the side:

The most precious picture of my collection at the orphanage show, a large herd of elephants in the river waters, is displayed as the curtain raiser for this article.

People from the state of Karnataka, to which we all belonged, are very familiar with the sight of elephants, especially in the famous elephant reserves of Bandipur and Kakankote forests. The elephant herds there are bigger and scattered over much larger areas as well. To see them in their truly natural habitat, one has to go on elephant safaris on tough four-wheel drive vehicles in rough forest terrain, violently bounced around constantly. In one such safari at Kakankote some years ago, I saw far away a herd of around a hundred by a rough estimate. Unfortunately, I couldn’t take a picture of it.

After the visit to the elephant sanctuary, we were taken northward about an hour’s journey away, to a beautiful state-run medicinal plants farm near the city of Kurunegala.  What followed was of little relevance to the tour and indeed a waste of time. We were received by a self-proclaimed ‘doctor’ who looked more like a prize fighter, with two of his assistants, claiming to be an expert in medicinal plants.  He proceeded to hold a long drawn out ‘class’ to educate us in appalling English on their benefits, and then the trio must have made a nice profit selling assorted ‘ayurvedic’ products of questionable value to the few unwary and gullible in the group. CS and I chose to skip the ‘class’, spending the time a great deal more fruitfully in exploring what was effectively a mini botanical garden.  After this onslaught on our time and tolerance, the bus left southeastward for the holy city of Kandy, in central Sri Lanka.   

Kandy and Buddha’s Tooth Relic

Kandy is the second largest city in Sri Lanka. Surrounded by mountains, which are home to the country’s famed tea plantations, and biodiverse rainforests, Kandy is also known for its Buddhist sites, including the Temple of the Tooth shrine (Sri Dalada Maligawa in Sinhalese). This is where our bus stopped after a little over two hours of journey.

The shrine is located in the royal palace complex of the former Kingdom of Kandy and houses the relic of the tooth of the Buddha. Since ancient times, the relic has played an important role in local politics because it is believed that whoever holds the relic holds the governance of the country. The relic was historically held by Sinhalese kings. The temple of the tooth is a World Heritage Site mainly because of its association with the relic. Below is a picture it in bright evening sunlight:

There was such a huge crowd of devotees and visitors inside the temple that I missed much of the details of whatever I could see inside, including the supposed location of the highly protected relic. However, some architectural features caught my attention. Here is one such feature, the ceiling of a long passage, apparently of recent times: 

I found the exterior of the temple complex more appealing than the busy noisy interior with its historic and symbolic artifacts, about which I thought I could try to understand later from a tourist literature package, including a DVD recording, provided thoughtfully by the local guide.

I left the place wondering if the great Gautama the Buddha ever imagined that the unostentatious movement he founded in ancient India, to address the trials and tribulations in the everyday world of the common man, would end up becoming a full-fledged religion as steeped in symbolism and ritualism as any, including the one he forsook!

Late that evening we were driven to the Grand Mountain Hotel over an hour’s drive north of Kandy in mountainous terrain near Matale, and the five-star hotel accommodation and environment was as good as its name.  After we had checked in and explored the interior, I was so speechless at the splendor and opulence radiated by the hotel that I wondered if we were really in Sri Lanka and not in any part of the world frequented only by the rich and the famous.  It was soon clear that the whole enterprise was run by the mainland Chinese, with no effort at playing it down.

As we were trying to settle down, our guide told us that our dinner had been prearranged in Kandy and therefore we had to go there.  Our bus duly drove us to a more ordinary looking hotel in Kandy and brought us back after dinner to the Grand Mountain Hotel late in the night.  When asked why we could not have been accommodated in some hotel in Kandy in the first place to avoid the faux pas of multiple trips and wasted time, our guide had a vague reply, which we couldn’t understand because of his poor English.

Here are two pictures of the interior of the Grand Mountain Hotel, but they do not really reflect the full extent of the splendor I observed:

Peradeniya Botanical Gardens

Spread over about 150 acres, the Royal Botanical Gardens of Peradeniya is located very close to Kandy.  An internationally famous botanical gardens, it attracts about 1.5 million visitors annually, about one-third of them from overseas. It is near the Mahaweli River, the longest river in Sri Lanka.  The garden hosts more than 4,000 species of plants, including orchids, spices, medicinal plants and palm trees. It is especially known for its orchids. Attached to it is the National Herbarium of Sri Lanka.

At the time of our visit the place was quite crowded, with just the ideal weather conditions prevailing. Here is a picture I took after some of us had entered through the main gate: 

The person in the foreground with a military gait is the highly talented ex-cricketer whom I mentioned earlier as the de facto leader of our group.  As such, I suppose he is summoning others also to get inside. Ahead of him is the long main road inside the large garden complex.

 Here is a pleasing picture of flora and rich greenery at one place with a few of our group members seen far in the rear: 

Below is another similarly pleasing view of the rich dense flora and greenery: 

The picture below shows a suspension bridge connecting the two parts of the gardens separated by the river:

One unusual feature of the gardens is the large number of bats seen clinging to the branches of trees, all heads down!  Here is one such view:

Established in 1843, the Royal Botanical Gardens has a large number of old trees with their branches and roots twisted into a bewildering variety of grotesque shapes and sizes.  Completing my mini photo album of these gardens at Peradeniya from my huge collection for the day, I am seen standing in front of one such specimen from a cluster of them in the picture below:

Our visit to these gardens was a very pleasant and highly satisfying experience, and certainly one of the highlights of our Sri Lanka trip.

Hills & Tea Plantations

After the visit to the botanical gardens, we set out on the road from Kandy to Nuwara Eliya, a slow journey of over three hours through the spectacular mountainous terrain that is part of the tallest such region in the country, and world-famous tea plantations.  It reminded me of the journey through the western ghats section in south India to reach Ooty from Mysore or Coimbatore.  With my camera clicking constantly, I added quite a few to my large collection of scenic pictures.  Below is a particularly attractive picture. Located in the small hill town of Ramboda, in a unique ecological zone of tropical montane forests and grasslands, the hotel building seen here, jutting out into the open from a cliff, is completely integrated into the terrain of the land. Ramboda also has a wonderful waterfall nearby.

At the nearby large Glenloch Tea Factory (see picture below), we were shown the whole process of manufacture of tea, starting from the most delicate stage of harvesting, all the way to drying and packaging the product.  We could also taste the tea prepared from it and purchase the packaged product, presumably at a discounted price.

On the way to Nuwara Eliya we saw several huge tea plantations owned by commercial enterprises, one of which is shown below:

 We reached the prominent tourist town of Nuwara Eliya late in the evening. Dubbed ‘Little England’ due to its cool climate and colonial-era bungalows, Nuwara Eliya is surrounded by mist-shrouded mountains, terraced tea plantations and numerous tourist hotels, in one of which we spent that night. Here is a night time view of the hotel facade: 

Next morning, we were on a long whole-day journey through the picturesque mountainous territory, dotted by large tea plantations, all the way to the western coast of the country.  Before that, a short distance away from Nuwara Eliya, we visited the legendary Seetha Amman temple, a revered place, especially for tourists from India, because of its great mythological association.  It is surrounded by beautiful scenery all around, providing a very tranquil atmosphere.  Here is a picture of the temple taken in misty conditions, with the huge depression at lower right signifying Hanuman’s footprint, quite literally! 

On our westward journey, just outside Nuwara Eliya, I captured the following sight of the idyllic Lake Gregory and its surroundings: 

Further outwards on the journey, we saw this enormous tea plantation in all its sunlit glory:

The mountainous terrain surrounding Nuwara Eliya is, not surprisingly, home to a large number of water falls, tall and short, large and small, single and split, many of which lined up alongside the land route we travelled.  Here is one such large water fall, most probably the one named Devon.

Here is another sublime roadside view of the hill terrain, with the ubiquitous tea plants: 

Here is my keepsake picture, taken by our group leader and cricketing hero, against the background of one of those numerous waterfalls on the way:

If my memory serves me right, this is the picturesque setting that marked our lunch at a hillside restaurant:

Waskaduwa – Citrus Resort

We arrived at the town of Waskaduwa on the western coast late in the evening after numerous stops along the way, absorbing the mostly sundrenched sights of the hills and the tea plantations. Our stay for that night was at the famed Citrus Resort with the sight of a beautiful blue sea close by.  Hear is a seaside view of the resort: 

And, here is an awesome view of the sea itself the next morning, accentuated by the dense cloudy sky: 

Madu River Safari

Later that morning, we drove down along the coastal road to the Madu river estuary, near the town of Balapitiya, where we spent an exciting hour and a half doing a river safari on rather overcrowded, but otherwise safe, boats. This was the southernmost part of western coastal Sri Lanka we visited. Seen below is the starting point of our river safari: 

Shown below is the only picture in my huge photographic collection from our three different overseas trips, featuring both CS and me, seen next to each other. We were fully geared up, ready to take off in the boat! 

We passed several islands during the ride, and got down in one, which was well known for processing cinnamon.  We spent some time seeing the several phases of the process. We also passed by some spectacular mangroves, which the estuary was famous for.  Here is one of several that I captured, very close up: 

But the most exciting experience of the safari came towards the end, for the more adventurous among our group. It was the ‘fish massage’, a sort of therapy where one dips one’s feet in a pond full of fish to be tickled by them constantly, and, apparently, the more the fish the merrier!  Here is our adventurous trio caught live with their feet down among the fish. I should have captured their faces too!  

Turtle Hatchery

Many places along the Sri Lankan coastline, including the southwest where we were traveling, are well known for their turtle hatcheries and turtle conservation projects.  We visited one such institution at Induruwa, north of the Madu river estuary, after our river safari.  We could see different stages of the whole process, from hatching of the eggs to full grown turtles, neatly differentiated.  Here is a picture of two of our group holding baby turtles in a pond reserved for them:

Here is a fully grown turtle at the end stage of the entire process:

Colombo

After the turtle hatchery visit, a two-hour drive northward along the coastal road took us to the last stop in our Sri Lanka tour, the nation’s capital city of Colombo.  We checked in at one of the best-known hotels of the city, the colonial Kingsbury Hotel near the city’s harbour. Here is a picture of its majestic façade and entrance:

Equally regal was its lobby pictured below:

That evening was spent on a long slow tour of the city highlights, without stopping at any particular place, except for a very long time at a large modern mall, giving the group a last chance to buy up whatever they fancied. CS and I were no more interested in this exercise there than in either of our two previous joint tours. So, we whiled away the time rather tediously, just window shopping and looking around in the neighborhood. We also had a long and useful conversation with a young Sri Lankan student who was particularly inquisitive about Indian mythology and asked us a lot of questions, only some of them fetching him satisfactory answers.  On our part, we gained some useful insight into life in his country, being able to compare it with the one we were accustomed to at home.

During the long tour of the city, I took quite a number of pictures without having to get down from the bus. They were representative of both its colonial past and a vibrant present, buoyed up by huge investments in the country by China, and soon to plunge into an unprecedented economic crisis.  One of the most impressive buildings in Colombo is the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall seen in the picture below:

One of the most beautiful buildings from Colombo’s colonial past is the City Hall pictured below:

At present the city also boasts of the Lotus Tower, a 350 m tall structure considered to be a symbolic landmark of Sri Lanka. Built after our visit to Sri Lanka, and with a huge investment from China, it is the tallest self-supported structure in South Asia.

The next day, before our scheduled departure from Colombo back home, we had a long period of spare time available for ourselves in the morning. CS and I had a long, leisurely and pleasant walk along the harbour road, quite close to the harbour itself, with great many ships berthed in what is one of the busiest, largest and deepest ports in the world. On the way we saw one of the oldest monuments of the city, the 29 m high Colombo Lighthouse, built in 1952.  Here is a picture I took after we had spent some time in its vicinity and up the platform:

To round up my photographic presentation of the Sri Lankan tour, below is a picture of one of the city’s iconic modern edifices, the imposing Sambodhi Chaithya Buddhist Stupa, also located along the harbour road. There was no indication that it was open to visitors, so we just went up to it, spent a few minutes under its shade and walked back all the way to the hotel.

Later that afternoon we returned to Bangalore by a direct flight from Colombo.

Summing up

The main takeaway from the tour for CS and me was the lasting memory of two magnificent stretches of tropical mountainous forest terrain, dotted with lush green plantations and sparse human activity, the first between Kandy and Nuwara Eliya, and the second, and much longer one, between the latter and the southwestern coast of the country.  It is this, the image of a beautiful and tranquil countryside of Sri Lanka that we liked to carry home with us, not of a strife torn country with its legacy of a long civil war, ethnic conflicts, natural disasters, terrorist onslaughts, covid aftermath and debilitating economic ills.  After all, we too have had our share of them at home!