The un-lonliest lonely planet place...Ella

Sooooo....the infamous Kandy - Ella train ride
It's voted the most beautiful train journey in the world and included as an actual attraction in the lonely planet guide.
......They were right the route is stunning, with picture perfect views. But sadly it was rather difficult for us to enjoy due to having no seats for the entire 7 hrs we were on the train!

Our first impressions of Ella
Once we arrived off the platform we were bombarded by locals trying to sell us rooms. Most of them very much out of budget!
One lady however asked us what we were willing to pay - we said max 2000lkr to which she too easily said yes...leading me to think I should have said 1500!
The homestay was 'holiday homes ella' and was close to the centre, had hot water and WiFi - so not too bad, the lady seemed lovely and helped us with bus times etc for our onward travel.

The village was interesting, clearly our 1998 Sri Lanka guide that called Ella a 'quiet undiscovered village full of charming locals' was very much out of date! It clearly was a place that had been built up on the fact that travel guides rated it as somewhere to go. Now it as full of restaurants and bars that had a westener's price tag with often not a local in sight (other than the staff working there!) For once on our trip it seemed we were not in the minority...and that felt almost sad.

Dinner
Tired from our trips and hungry we decided to eat near to the homestay - but ended up being in the place voted no.1 on trip advisor! AK Bistro was a lovely clean place with a fusion of Japanese, Sri labkan and Italian foods. Gary ate pasta while I had devilled chicken (a popular sauce used over here) with boiled veg- which I was very much craving instead of rice! The food was great, it was an expensive treat in our eyes (although the whole meal still probably only coated £14 for both of us!)

Day 2 Ella
This morning we woke up and walked up little Adams peak - an easy walk to the top as there are stairs, but breathtaking views from the top. We meandered through tea fields on our way up and were even harassed by an old lady en route, who seemed to be picking tea. to take photos with her and then give her money!

After Adams peak we took a tuk tuk to a local tea factory (haptule) unfortunately it had stopped work for the day so we couldn't do the tour (due to it being dry season they finish work early) so instead we went to the rooftop cafe and had an amazing cup of tea with amazing views!
We then planned to go the the waterfall, but the heavens opened so we surcumed to 'chill bar' and I tried a lassie while Gary had a beer.

Dinner
That night we are somewhere that cooked local Sri Lankan food -(jade green)  we had to pre order in the afternoon but it was delicious and there was plenty of it! It was cheaper than the previous evening, but still not Sri Lankan prices...especially as everywhere in Ella adds a 10% service charge.

The Train

Walking up Little Adams Peak

To the hill county and the Perehera at Kandy

Bus Journey
We got the bus to Kandy from Habarana, it took about 4 hours on the bus (mostly standing) joys of the public transport here! The scenery became infinitely greener and more hilly once we were about an hour away which took our minds off of our sore feet! Gary had made friends with a local guy who had offered to help us out at the Festival and find somewhere good to sit/stand and also help us avoid being hassled too much which was kind! He seemed genuine, so Gary took his details.

Booking Train Tickets
Once in Kandy, we headed straight to the train Station in the hope of getting tickets to Ella 2 days later...However due to the Perahera Festival all reservable seats were taken, so we were simply advised to turn up early on the day to get the ticket & fight everyone else for a seat....I think if you plan on doing this journey its advisable to book at least a week in advance at either Kandy or Colombo Stations or online with one of the private companies!


Getting ready for the festival fun! 
So we went on to walk to our hotel... Thank goodness for Google maps as it was quite a walk from town and down some very narrow windy 'roads' we stayed at Satyodaya Education centre as it seemed the cheapest available with ensuite and not too far from the festival action! The rooms were clean and basic and there was good quick wifi.

After a quick shower we headed back into town to meet our new friend along with some fellow travellers- stopping for a quick sri lankan dinner String hoppers, curry & Kothu, before facing the crowds to find somewhere to sit.

Buddika (our Sri Lankan friend) was true to his word and great at getting rid of the many people trying to sell us seats to watch the parade.

We found somewhere on the main stretch of road to sit which was great, the atmosphere was great with all of the local people incredibly excited about the festival. It was a long wait for it to start, but once it did it was worth it!

The Kandy Esala Perahera 
This historical procession is held annually to pay homage to the Sacred Tooth Relic of the Lord Buddha, which is housed at a temple in Kandy. The procession started with men dancing with large whips that were swung around and made a loud bang like a gunshot once it came into contact with the ground, followed by fire dancers - some of which were very young! Then each parts of the temple had its own parade (4 in total) which included a variety of different types of musicians & dancers from different parts of Sri Lanka as well as a lot of elephants with extremely grand outfits. The whole parade was fascinating and clearly something that the people of Sri Lanka enjoy very much and is very much a symbol of the country and it's Buddhist history.

We were a little dubious about the elephants, of course they were in chains and some had even been trained to dance with the music, but it is clearly such a big part of their culture and it was very interesting to see. The festival went on to midnight so it was a very long day! 

Day 2 in Kandy

The following morning we went to the Temple of the sacred tooth, to find out more about the relic. Costing 1000LKR each. It was very interesting, we were able to learn a lot about the relic as well as see many old Buddhist artefacts & gifts in the museum. There was also a part of the museum dedicated to showing the damage that had been caused to the temple in the 1998 bombings. The tooth itself is held in a gold casket, which is held in the centre of the shrine - it was very grand and beautiful! Outside in the temple grounds there were other buildings with smaller museums - all included in the ticket price (apart from the World Buddhism Museum - extra 500LKR). You could spend a long time looking around them all - we decided to look in the Tusker museum - dedicated to an Elephant named Raja. His stuffed remains are inside - he served for the Perehara for over 50 yrs so they made the museum in his memory. I have to say it was weird seeing a stuffed Elephant!

After this we went for tea and then a walk around the lake. En route we were asked by some American travellers if we knew where they would find Helga's Folly - we hadn't heard of it but Gary pulled it up on google maps to show them. Intrigued we asked what it was and they told us it was a very eccentricly decorated hotel that is visited by many people due to how interesting it is to have a look around! So we decided to follow them and see what all the fuss was about...It was a long walk but it was certainly interesting once we got there! The hotel was more like an art gallery with the walls painted with various pictures and there being fabulously lavish furniture! The drink was certainly expensive by Sri Lankan Standards...$3 for a Sprite... but it was fun! 

After walking back we found somewhere to have some tasty Sri Lankan food....we were eating amongst tuk tuk drivers and locals...a very good sign! We tried lots of different things..I'll do a post later covering all of the culinary delights we tried in Sri Lanka and what they are!

Kandy Perehara

The top 3 photos are from google as our camera didn't manage to take many good ones due to the poor lighting!

The Scared Temple of the tooth

Seeing the cultural triangle with Habarana as a base

Transport
We left Negombo town en route to Habarana. We had to take 2 buses, one to kurunugela and then the next to habarana. It took around 5 hours, mainly due to major roadworks on the dambulla road which had us and standstill for nearly an hour. The bus journey was fun..but be warned the bus drivers here have a need for speed and love driving on the wrong side of the road towards oncoming traffic in order to get to where they want to be!
Seats can be difficult to get at times and aircon is a rarity. We learned the red buses here are government run whereas all the others are from private companies. And often the private companies will detour to drop off a friend or go massively off route in the aim of getting more passengers.

We arrived in Habarana centre and got a tuk tuk to the outskirts (Hiriwadunna)  where 'Homly Guest'....our home for the next 3 nights. When we arrived the guy seemed anxious and spoke very little English. But kept mentioning his Jeep. He helped us with our bags to our room, which looked clean, tidy and exactly as in the pictures. We changed and went to sit on the veranda with our calendar and guidebook to make a rough plan for the next few days.....where to start!

We looked at the sights of the cultural triangle and figured it would be best to do the one furthest away first. This was Anuradhapura the ancient city. The bus picked up from Habarana centre and would take around 90mins.
So we awoke early to catch the bus before it became too hot and it dropped us off in the New town at the expected time. We then had to navigate ourselves to the old sacred city to begin the sightseeing. Thankfully most people are super friendly and it only took a few awkward questions before we knew where we were going.
Turns out it is quite a walk! Especially in the heat! So we succumbed to the idea of hiring a tuk tuk to take us round all the sights, which definitely the right move (cost 1200 lkr for the day)...you can also hire bikes but like I said it was very hot! And actually the sights are actually very spaced out.
The sights are amazing - so crazy to think that in ancient times people had the capabilities to build such things!
A point to note is that as it is a Buddhist sacred city and there are lots of temples and Buddha statues - you must always have your shoulders covered and shoes and headwear off. This suddenly becomes a challenge to a poor westener like you or I, whose feet are not used to this and find walking on hot paving stones similar to walking on hot molten lava!
We had a great day and were also offered by our tuk tuk driver an additional trip to Minhitale where there is a large Buddha on the top of a big hill (additional 1,500). But by this point we were very tired and needed to just get back an relax!

The following day we went with another couple we'd met,  to Sigirya rock in the morning and Dambulla temple caves in the afternoon. Again we took the bus from Habarana - we got off at the Sigirya junction and went by tuk tuk to the rock. Sigirya rock is famous for the beautiful water gardens at the top and is another UNESCO site. We actually decided to not climb Sigirya rock itself but instead pidurangala Rock which is a third of the price (1000LKR), without the cues and you actually get to look at Sigirya properly and take photos of it. It's also much more fun to climb as there are no steps up to the top.

We then went onto Dambulla where despite the cheap gold exterior once you get inside the site is very beautiful and amazing that the caves could have been carved into temples so long ago, with such detail.  But watch out for the mischievous monkeys... If they see you opening your bag they suddenly become very interested in what your doing!!

We missed out Pollunuwara (the other sacred city) mainly because of time and that having looked at some other people's pictures it looked vaguely similar to Anuradhapura.

Anuradhapura:

Our Tuk Tuk for Anuradhapura!

Sigiriya -Climbing Pidurangala

Sigiriya Rock

Top of Sigiriya:

Dambulla - Temple Caves

And finally...some sand between my toes...Colombo & Negombo

So we left Heathrow airport on the evening on Wed 19th of August at 9.30pm and flew through the night (Sri Lankan Airways) to Colombo - Sri Lanka's international airport. The flight was good, with a generous in flight bar service (that obviously was much appreciated!) and 2 meals - dinner @ 11.30pm and breakfast at 4.30am....our poor body clock's didn't know what was going on!
We arrived at 12.30pm local time (20th) and were greeted with a hot and humid climate that almost immediately brought us out in a sweat! The airport was fairly easy to navigate around and we found our baggage without too much trouble. Laden with our large backpacks we headed out to book a taxi. We decided to stick with the airport booking service as although expensive, took all of the stress out of having to find one ourselves.
When we showed the taxi man our booking ticket followed by the hotel details, he scratched his head and shook it vigorously muttering something in Sri Lankan. He showed his fellow taxi rivers the address of our hotel, all of whom again shook their heads.....worrying...anyhow...the taxi man helped us put our bags into the back of the cab and ushered us inside. Once outside the airport and driving down the busy roads we were excited for what Sri Lanka would have in store for us. After about 15 minutes of driving the taxi driver pulled over, showing our hotel address to a local. They pointed in the direction we were going (reassuring) and so the taxi man got back in and we continued to drive. However, a few minutes later he pulled over again to ask another person who again pointed in the direction we were going. After a few hundred yards I saw a sign pointing right with our hotel name 'Summerside Residence' (http://www.summersideresidence.com/) I told the taxi driver to turn right, he looked confused pulling over again to ask a passer-by, but this time seemed to have a longer more fruitful conversation, he smiled and turned to us saying 'I know' before pulling off. A few minutes later, rather sweaty from the journey we heaved our bags out of the car into the safety of the hotel. They were thankfully expecting us and took the booking confirmation from us before taking us upstairs to our room.
The room was light airy and modern with a lovely bathroom and balcony - Also the air-con worked beautifully. We got changed out of our travelling clothes and opted for some smaller beach clothes so that we could get out and enjoy the sunshine.
We walked past street vendors, stopping at one to buy some water (1.5ltr -85 LKR - about 40p) before finding the walkway through to the beach. BOY were we pleased...At this point we knew exactly why we were here! We walked up and down the beach watching the fisherman boats and children playing in the sea before deciding to sit in one of the beach bars and have a well deserved beer! It felt amazing to have the sand between our toes and sun on our backs - It was a far cry from the weather forecast we had seen stating it would be raining!
The local Sri Lankan beer is Lion and very refreshing. We ordered large bottles, costing around £1.50 each, so not too expensive. After spending some time unwinding we decided we really needed to head back and shower before eating. Probably not the best move as this made both of us realise how exhausted we were and when we were both dressed we realised that there was no way we wanted to go and sit in a restaurant. Thankfully there was a street vendor on our road serving portions of fried rice. We ordered 2 which came to 750 LKR (About £3) we then proceeded to take this back to our room to enjoy before falling into bed and sleeping like babies until the morning.
21st
We awoke and had breakfast - which was amazing - omelette, fresh fruits, yogurt & toast!
Then found ourselves a room for the night online before heading upstairs and collecting our bags. We got a tuk tuk to Negombo City where we had booked a room to stay - It was close to the bus station which was what we needed for our early morning bus on the 22nd. However, on arrival (Mazz's Homestay) there had been an issue with agoda's booking system and the room had actually already been booked! Rome the owner was very kind - making us coffee and offering to sort us an alternative hotel. We declined his offer of a beach hotel as we had just come from there and wanted to be close to the bus stn so he took us to look at a hotel that was mainly used by the locals. It looked fine and we didn't want to cause too much of a fuss so took it. It didn't come with breakfast so Rome offered for us to go back there before our bus journey. We decided to go into the city and take a walk around. By this point the sun was very hot. We soon realised that Negombo city had nothing really to offer tourists - there weren't really many cafes or restaurants and certainly no bars. After getting very hot and sweaty and having achieved not much more than having lunch and sorting a local SIM, we returned to our hotel room. On closer inspection we realised the place couldn't have seen a mop or duster in years, the window was broken and the bed filthy. Thankfully we had packed our own pillowcases and cotton sleeping bag liners!
We found a local restaurant for dinner and had Veg fried rice & Chicken Kothu (A very yummy local dish). We also had some Paratha with a 'curry gravy' which again was very nice. Having filled our boots on only 350LKR we headed home, stopping in a local "Wine shop" for 2 Lions in the hope it might help us sleep in our room of terrors.
Needless to say neither of us slept much...there were plenty of mozzies, due to the broken window, our neighbour decided to suddenly start playing sri lankan music at midnight and the fan barely touched the thick muggy air.
We were certainly pleased to get back to Mazz's for tea, fruit and toast early the next morning before heading on our bus to our next Stop!

I would gladly live out of a suitcase...if it meant I could see the world.

So..we've finished work and (pretty much) moved out - bar the technicalities of handing in our keys!!
We've had great fun fitting the contents of our house into my mums loft...and are now spending time working round all of our lovely family and friends saying our goodbyes.
So homeless & jobless and bags packed we're ready to embark on our big adventure.

We're currently visiting family down in Weymouth before heading back to Bristol.
Today we visited Bridport, had chips and a whippy ice cream on the bay...we're making the most of eating good old British favourites before we depart! Followed by a lovely roast pork dinner and rice pudding!! (Seems eating is all we've been doing since the wedding!! - Thank god for rennee!)

We spent time on our tablet tonight sorting boring things like cancelling direct debits as well as our Australian visas...lots of fun!!

Tomorrow we head to the lobster pot on Portland Bill for a cream tea before we leave. (http://www.lobsterpotrestaurantportland.co.uk )
They do a gluten free version..so Abi's happy!!!
Check out the pics below!!

Now we're off to bed in the hope that our food will go down in time for more tomorrow!

Gary & Abi xx