Culture in Kandy, hiking in Ella

Kandy, the former capital, is one of the biggest cities in Sri Lanka. Nowadays it is famous for its culture and religious events. As it is located in the Hill Country the climate is cooler than in other parts of Sri Lanka. The streets in Kandy are busy and traffic is chaotic and air is thick of exhaust fumes, like in almost every city in Sri Lanka, but after few days you don't pay any attention to it anymore. 

At the second evening we visited one of the numerous dance halls that have a daily show, mainly for tourists. Originally only males were permitted to train as dancers, but luckily there has been some progress and now there is a lot of female dancers as well. As the Kandyan dance is normally performed with only percussions, the costumes take control of the stage. There is bling bling and masks on everyone, and anklets that rattle at each step and jump.

Kandy holds the Temple of the Tooth Relic, which is one of the most sacred places of the Buddhist world. Our visit to this World Heritage site didn’t go as planned, as one of us nearly fainted during the holy tooth relic ceremony! Fortunately, we got help from a local Buddhist, who knew which nerve points to press, so we were able to go back to the temple and see a glimpse of the place where the tooth is kept. After this we headed straight to the hotel to get some rest. During the night we discovered that both of us had got a traditional stomach flu, which kept us at bay for one more day in Kandy, before we jumped on the train heading deeper into Hill Country, towards Ella.

The train ride from Kandy to Ella is appreciated as one of the most beautiful rides in the world and evidently locals are also keen to it as well. We noticed this when trying to buy tickets, and heard that all tickets are sold out for the whole of December! Apparently this is the local holiday season, but luckily they reserve a small share of tickets for each train to be sold at the same day, so we only had to be on time at the station to get on the train.

Ella is located in the most beautiful Hill Country of Sri Lanka, and you're able to see it has a tourism-oriented spirit and economy. As the climate is optimal for tea plantations, there is one in every other hill side. Half an hour from Ella, in the town of Haputale, is one plantation that we all have heard of, Lipton's Seat. We gave a visit to these hills and did a tour in the Dambatenne tea factory. Now we know how bulk tea is made - they produce it around 5 tons a day!

One tea-leaf picker collects around 30 kilos of tealeaves daily.

As Ella is very popular among tourists, it was no surprise that there you'll find almost all western menu options in restaurants and coffee lounges aimed to quite exclusively to tourists. And the amount of guest houses, phew.. What the town of Ella itself may lack in sights to see, the views and the surrounding nature make up that loss! 

As we missed the famous pilgrim destination, Adam’s Peak (and it's 5000 steps up the mountain), because we got ill, we got to do the small one instead. And even this Little Adam's Peak had stunning views down to the valley, and it left us wondering, what we may have missed.