May 18-23, 2014: Adam's Peak, Sinharaja, and back to Haputale

In Haputale on the morning of the 18th the sky was sunny and clear.  I enjoyed the long views south down to the plains from my terrace and then later from the hotel restaurant during breakfast.  About 10:30 I left by train on the very scenic journey through the hills to Hatton, about 45 miles northwest of Haputale, a trip that took a bit over three hours and cost me a dollar in second class.  I had a window seat in a comfortable, relatively new, Chinese made carriage and very much enjoyed the trip through hills covered in forest and tea plantations, with a big waterfall to be seen and more than 20 tunnels to pass through.  From Haputale at 4700 feet it took the train about an hour to climb up to the summit at about 6200 feet and then it slowly descended to Hatton at about 4200 feet, stopping at several little stations along the way with the white uniformed station masters watching the train go by. 

From Hatton it is less than 20 miles southwest to the little village of Dalhousie at the foot of Adam's Peak, but it took me more than two hours to get there, first on a bus to the town of Maskeliya for more than an hour and then another on to Dalhousie.  The trip through the green terrain was, however, beautiful, with hills covered in tea and forest and passing a couple of reservoirs.  Arriving in Dalhousie about 4:30, I could see the steep, triangular Adam's Peak through the swirling late afternoon clouds.  I talked to a couple of other guests at my hotel about the climb up and then took a short walk around the area.  By nightfall the sky was completely clear and the peak, 3000 feet above Dalhousie, was fully visible. 

Adam's Peak, also called Sri Pada, is Sri Lanka's fifth highest mountain at 7369 feet elevation and a big pilgrimage site for Buddhists from December to Vesak Poya at the full moon in May.  There are two routes up, a much longer one from the southwest starting near Ratnagiri and a shorter one from the northeast starting in Dalhousie.  The route from Dalhousie is lit up at night during the pilgrimage season, as most pilgrims and tourists hike up at night to see the sunrise.  There are something like 5500 steps to the top from Dalhousie.  The pilgrimage season had just ended, but there were still tourists heading up the peak.  I didn't want to hike up in the dark and so decided to start just before dawn.  I went to bed early, but barking dogs kept me from falling asleep until after 11.

I was up at 5 the next morning.  The sky was clear and the moon, four days past full, shone brightly.  The sky began to brighten as I started out about 5:20 in the cool morning air.  The trail starts off past a few temples and a large stone arch and then rises through tea fields.  I climbed up to a big white dagoba (stupa) along the trail, with a steep cliff behind with water streaming down it in places.  I saw the sun rise just after 6.  There were excellent views over the countryside and up towards the steep peak as I climbed the steps.  It is a bit over four miles to the top. Abandoned tea shops, closed after the end of the pilgrimage season, were scattered on that sunny morning about 40 people passed me on their way down.  

The steps became very steep towards the top, with great views down over the countryside.  About 8:30 I reached the top, at 7369 feet elevation.  A small temple sits on the top enclosing a sacred footprint of Buddha, or Adam, or, most likely, nobody, but the temple was locked up after the end of the pilgrimage season.  So I missed a view of the sacred footprint.  I have seen photos of it, though, and it looks too big even for Bigfoot.  The views from the top were great.  On a clear day you can see Colombo on the coast to the west, but the lowlands to the west were cloud covered.  A ridge of green hills to the south were occasionally fringed with big white clouds.  To the east the sun glinted over the hills and reservoir below.  After looking around, I sat at the top eating a sandwich I had brought with me. I had the place to myself except for two caretakers and lots of annoying flies attracted by all the garbage around.

I enjoyed the views but was glad to leave the flies after a half hour on top.  Two women tourists arrived just as I started down.  I walked down slowly, with several stops to rest, or eat, or to watch the birds and butterflies and enjoy the views.  Clouds occasionally poured through a gap in the hills below and then retreated.  During one stretch cicadas or some similar insect made a lot of noise.  The sky was sunny most of the way down, with a few clouds.

Back at my hotel about noon, I had lunch and spent most of the afternoon on my balcony reading.  The sky clouded up and it rained about 5.  Just before dark I took a short walk down the road, passing hillsides of tea.  The sky was cloudy and Adam's Peak hidden.  I went to bed about 8:30 and slept ten hours.

The sky was sunny and clear the next morning.  The 8:30 bus to Hatton left at 8:15 as I was eating breakfast and the 9:30 bus didn't show up.  At 10:40 I boarded a bus headed to Hatton, but it then stopped a few hundred feet down the road and didn't get going until 11:45.  I didn't mind the wait much.  I sat and read and watched the tea pluckers walk by.  Adam's Peak was visible all morning.  I enjoyed the very slow, but scenic bus trip back to Hatton, too, with occasional views of Adam's Peak and lots of views of tea covered hillsides.

Arriving in Hatton after the two and a half hour, twenty mile bus trip, I caught another bus at 2:30 heading west, to Colombo, down a beautiful gap in the hills along a river gorge.  From Hatton at 4200 feet it took us almost three hours to descend 45 miles to the town of Avissawella, where I got off, at less than 100 feet elevation and about 25 miles east of Colombo.  Starting down the gap in the hills from Hatton, I saw the blue train coming from Kandy, and before that Colombo, on the other side of the valley.  The mountainous scenery on the way down was spectacular, with a few views of Adam's Peak.  About half way between Hatton and Avissawella we reached the town of Kitulgala, at about 300 feet elevation.  Just a couple a miles upriver from town the river scenes from the movie The Bridge over the River Kwai were filmed.  The foundations of the bridge blown up in the movie are said to still exist.  The river views from the road were beautiful and the area is now a whitewater rafting area.

The air had become warm and humid on the way down.  From Avissawella I took a 5:30 bus heading southeast 27 miles to the city of Ratnapura through green, hilly countryside.  The trip was a very slow one, taking over an hour and a half.  The sky was dark after 6:30.  In Ratnapura I found a little hotel on a steep hillside in the dark, having to climb about a hundred stairs to get to it.  However, I got a comfortable room and a good dinner there.  I was now southwest of Adam's Peak after having made a sort of irregular semi-circle around it.

The next morning was cloudy and humid.  Ratnapura, in the hilly lowlands just below the mountains, is one of the rainiest places in Sri Lanka, with 150 to 200 inches of rain per year.  I had a good breakfast in the friendly little hotel, with views out over rice paddies and hills.  After breakfast I walked into town to check out buses and was told there was no bus to Deniyaya, where I wanted to go, until 1:30.  I took a short walk around town.  There isn't much to see.  Ratnapura is the main town in Sri Lanka's premier gem district, so there were lots of folks offering to sell me gems.  I spent some time in an internet cafe, during which a heavy rainstorm hit. I walked back to my hotel in the rain for lunch, and after lunch, under a now clearing sky, walked to the bus station only to be told that the 1:30 bus had broken down and I would have to wait for the 2:45 bus. 

I did finally leave Ratnapura on a short, decrepit bus bound for Deniyaya, about 60 miles south, at 2:45.  One of my guidebooks had said the bus trip would take two and a half hours, but it took almost four and a half.  The road was good for the first hour or so, but then we reached a portion were it was being reconstructed and that was slow.  We reached the town of Rakwana about 4:30 and after that the road was very narrow and slow, but through spectacular hills covered with tea and forest and in a few places rubber trees.  This outcrop of hills stands south of Sri Lanka's central mountains.  The road twisted up hairpin curves and along mountainsides rising to over 2800 feet.  The sky had been clearing and there were great views north towards the steep central mountains.  I could also see the big reservoir of Uda Walawe on the plains to the east, where I had seen lots of elephants in the national park more than two weeks before.  I very much enjoyed the spectacular hilly scenery, with a few tea factories along the way, and was sorry when it became dark about 6:30.  We were descending towards Deniyaya by then, at about 2000 feet elevation.  We reached Deniyaya, at about 1250 feet elevation, just after 7.  I found a little hotel next to the owner's house and had a good rice and curry dinner, with curd and treacle (from the sap of a fan palm tree) for dessert.

I had come to Deniyaya to visit the nearby Sinharaja Forest Reserve, a very wet, rainy tropical forest.  I had arranged for Bandula, the hotel owner, to take me there the next morning, but the morning was rainy and we didn't get started until after the sky began to clear after 9.  From Deniyaya we drove west for about seven miles past rice paddies before reaching the forest preserve entrance at about 10:30.

From the entrance, at about 900 feet elevation, we walked west along the Gin Ganga River, which eventually flows to Galle on the coast, through beautiful, wet forest.  Bandula was very good at spotting lizards, birds and other small wildlife.  After less than a mile we crossed the river to a series of buildings where you can stay and rested there a while.  Bandula had gathered some mangos on the way and we ate those.  I sat for a while as he disappeared and then reappeared with a bright green pit viper on a small branch he carried.  It was only about a foot long, and very thin, but poisonous.  He coaxed it onto a tree branch and left it there as we recrossed the river and climbed up into the hills of the forest reserve.

We walked to a waterfall where we had lunch about 12:30.  We began a steeper climb after lunch, climbing about 300 feet to another, more spectacular, waterfall.  On the way Bandula spotted a rare, endemic lizard and an endemic butterfly.  He seemed quite excited by the lizard, and it was a very interesting one, with a round ball at the tip of its nose.

At the waterfall we took off our shoes and put our feet in the water of the pool below, where little black fish, the largest maybe three inches long, nibbled at the dead skin on our feet. At first it was a little disconcerting, ticklish, but then I got used to it.  Ten or more fish would nibble on each foot. A couple of river shrimp, maybe four inches long, appeared and did some dead skin nibbling of their own.  I enjoyed watching them.  It was much more ticklish when I lifted my feet off the pool bottom to let them nibble at the underside of my feet.  There had been lots of leeches along the trail, and I had been able to pull and flick most of them off before they attached themselves to my feet, but one had gotten through and attached to the top of my left foot.  By the time I took off my shoes at the pool it had drunk its full and dropped off, but the little wound, filled with leech anticoagulant, still bled.  I noticed some of the little fish ate up the little rivulets of blood in preference to the dead skin of my feet.

We spent about an hour there, enjoying the view of the waterfall and the nibbling of the little fish.  As earlier on the hike, it occasionally rained, and then the sun would come out.  I think I was just as wet from my sweat and the humidity as from the rain.  From the waterfall we walked along a trail back towards the Gin Ganga, a trail swarming with leeches.  It seemed like every couple of hundred feet we had to stop and pull ten or so off of each foot.  Some were very small and hard to spot.  Others would cling to your fingers as you pulled them off your feet. It was a real trial and made for an unpleasant walk.   And some inevitably got through.  It was quite a relief to reach the less leech infested path along the river.  During the hike I must have pulled at least a hundred, and maybe two hundred, leeches off my feet.   We passed a huge (maybe four or five inches long, including its legs), but harmless, spider on the way. 

Near the end of the hike, as we again neared the entrance, we finally spotted a purple faced leaf monkey, but it was high in a tree.  They, along with grey langurs and toque macaques, are the three species of monkey found in Sri Lanka.  I think both the purple face leaf monkey and the toque macaque are endemic.  The toque macaque, a couple of which we saw in the reserve, is similar to all the macaques I saw in India.  We reached the reserve entrance at about 4 and then walked back to the car for the drive back to Deniyaya, which we reached about 5.  I was a little disappointed not to spend either the early morning hours or late afternoon hours in the reserve.  Back at the hotel I took a shower, washed my clothes, and counted the leech bites, about ten, on my feet.  The little hotel's six rooms had all been reserved for the night, so I was given a much less pleasant room in the house that Bandula told me was his mother's room.  Fortunately, she did not come with the room.

The next morning I spent a leisurely several hours eating breakfast and reading Bandula's books on mammals and insects, and then left at 11 on the return trip north, this time to Pelmadulla, before Ratnapura.  I again enjoyed the scenic trip through the hills, though they were not as lovely at midday as at late in the afternoon.  Uda Walawe Reservoir was hidden by haze.  It took the slow bus about four hours to cover the 50 or so miles from Deniyaya to Pelmadulla, rising from 1250 feet at Deniyaya up to 2800 feet, and then down to about 400-500 feet at Pelmadulla.

After a half hour wait in Pelmadulla, I caught a 3:30 bus heading east to Haputale, two and a quarter hours away.  I had to stand, or mostly sit on the back steps of the bus, for the first half hour before getting a seat in the last row. as we rose through green hills just south of the central mountains, rising to about 1800 feet.  After I got a seat we continued climbing through green hills, with a steep climb up the last portion to Haputale at 4700 feet elevation.  During this last climb there were hazy views south over the plains and we hit fog about 200 feet below Haputale.  I was happy to reach again the cool air of Haputale.  I checked into a hotel near the train station and watched the sun set into the clouds just over the hills to the west.  While the south side of the ridge upon which Haputale sits was enshrouded with fog, the north was clear.   Before nightfall I took a short walk around town and watched a train from Colombo and Kandy arrive to and depart from the station.  The cool mountin air felt good on my itchy leech bites.

May 15-17, 2014: Haputale

I left Ella about 9:30 on the morning of the 15th, taking the train about 15 miles southwest to Haputale.  The hour long trip was very scenic, passing green hills and, between Bandarawela and Haputale, tea estates, with Tamil women picking tea.  Haputale is situated on a ridge about 4700 feet in elevation, with plains to the south heading to the sea and rows of green hills to the north.  Because of its exposed position on the ridge, it often gets fogged in, but was sunny when I arrived and stayed that way all day long.

I checked into a hotel room with excellent, though hazy, views south, and then looked around town.  The town itself doesn't have much to see, other than the spectacular views.  There is an old English church, with weathered gravestones.  The town's population is mainly Tamil, what are called "Plantation Tamils."  The ancestors of the Tamils who live in the north of the country have been on the island for one or two millennia, but the Tamils in the hills are descended from workers brought to the island by the British in the 19th century. About a million immigrated then to work first in the coffee and then the tea plantations.  When the British first settled in the hills in the 1820's and 1830's, they planted coffee.  But a leaf fungus devastated the industry in the 1870's, leading to its replacement by tea.  Sri Lanka is now the world's second biggest tea exporter, after India.

After lunch at my hotel, with a wide view south, I walked from town west along a road for a couple of miles, climbing about 500 feet in altitude to a stone mansion completed in 1931 by a planter named Sir Thomas Villiers and named Adisham after the village where he was born in Kent.  I passed tea covered hillsides for the last part of the walk.  The mansion is now owned by the Benedictine Order, though they allow visitors on certain days.  From the gray, somewhat forbidding mansion there were good, but hazy, views towards the hills to the north.  Inside only two rooms can be visited, a sitting room with a portrait over the mantel of Villiers, and the library full of histories and biographies dating from the early 20th century. The place was packed with local people on that day, a holiday, the second day of the Vesak Poya holiday.  I walked back the way I had come, much nicer in the late afternoon, and noticed a profusion of wildflowers along the road. The sky was still clear and I watched the just past full moon rise soon after dark.

The sky was clear the next morning.  I just missed the 6:30 bus, which left early, heading to the Dambatene Tea Factory, about five miles to the east.  I had planned to walk from there to the viewpoint called Lipton's Seat, another five miles from Dambatene.  The next bus was at 7:30, so I hired a tuktuk to take me all the way to Lipton's Seat, and was later glad I didn't attempt to walk from Dambatene.  The scenery on the drive in the tuktuk in the early morning sun was lovely, with tea covered hillsides, some very steep, all the way. Just after Dambatene, where the road began to ascend steeply, there were hundreds of schoolkids, most all in while, walking to school at a little past 7 in the morning.  The early morning sun lit up the green tea covered hillsides.

The tuktuk dropped me off and I walked up the last bit, a little less than a mile.  It felt like a steep mile, though it was only something like a 500 foot rise.  The tea covered hills on the way were beautiful, with dry stone retaining walls along the road.  I reached Lipton's Seat, at between 6200 and 6300 feet, according to my altimeter, and the view was great, though hazy to the south, where it dropped off to the plains.  The site is named after Sir Thomas Lipton, who made Ceylon Tea (as it is still called, though the country's name was changed from Ceylon in 1972) famous.  He owned this tea estate and enjoyed coming here for the view.  It is the highest point on the estate.

I spent about a half hour there enjoying the views and cool morning air, and then walked down to Dambatene, a 1400 foot drop which took me a little over two hours.  I enjoyed the beautiful walk down, passing tea pluckers waist or even chest deep among the tea bushes.  Their hands move very fast as they pluck the leaves.  Once one has two big handfuls of leaves, she stuffs the leaves into the bag on her back. They were very friendly, some posing for photographs.  The sun was getting hotter as I descended and about 10 I broke out my umbrella to act as a parasol.

I reached Dambatene about 10:30 and was hot and tired.  The tea factory, the largest one I have ever seen, has tours, but on arrival I was tired and just sat in the reception area, eating some cookies and drinking the last of my water.  I finally got up to get some water from a little store outside just as the bus back to Haputale was getting ready to leave, so I decided to skip the factory tour (I had toured a couple of other tea factories in India) and jumped on the bus.  I enjoyed the slow trip back on that rickety old bus.

Back in town, I drank a lot more water and persuaded the waiter at my hotel to prepare me an omelet, toast, fruit and tea breakfast, though it was past noon.  I was still very tired and thought that would revive me.  After eating I went back to my room and lay down for about an hour and a half.  I was hot and, finally, it occurred to me that I might have a fever, so I took my temperature, which was 100.8.  I was quite surprised to have my fever come back after four days.  I took some Tylenol and spent the rest of the afternoon in bed. I didn't fall asleep, though, perhaps because of the four big cups of tea I had drunk for lunch.  Before nightfall my temperature was back to normal and I felt fine, though I skipped dinner and went to bed early.

The next morning I felt fine.  The view south onto the plains seemed a little clearer, though the sky was a little less clear than previous mornings.  I could see the big reservoir at Uda Walawe National Park, where I had seen elephants almost two weeks earlier.  I ate a good breakfast and a little after 9 took a bus a mile or so and then walked the rest of the way back to Adisham Monastery.  I didn't reenter the monastery but instead took a trail through the forest further west, with ferns, big trees, and good views north over the valley below and the hills beyond.  Occasionally I could see the train tracks below, hugging the ridge that I was near the top of. The path wound its way along the ridge for about two miles before descending to the train tracks at a spot with great, but again hazy, views south over the plains.  Near the gap tea pluckers were at work on the steep hillside.

I walked further west along the train tracks less than a mile, passing through a short tunnel (number 36) on the way, before reaching the very small Idalgashina train station.  I arrived there about the same time as a train coming the other way.  The train was mostly composed of freight and tanker cars, but there were two old third class carriages at the back.  I hopped on and, tired but without a fever, sat on the floor of the crowded carriage as we waited almost a half hour on a siding for a train coming the opposite direction.  We finally got going about 12:30 and I stood up and enjoyed the views on the 15 minute, four or five mile trip back to Haputale.

After lunch at the hotel I spent the rest of the afternoon either relaxing on my terrace and enjoying the view or using the hotel's computer to access the internet.  The sky was a bit cloudier that afternoon, but still there was none of the mist that often covers the town. 

May 10-14, 2014: Ella

It was sunny and hot in Wellawaya on the morning of the 10th, with good views of the hills to the north.  After a good, but tardy, breakfast, I left on a bus about 10 heading north to Ella in the hills.  The 17 mile trip took a little over an hour as the crowded bus climbed slowly into the hills.  I had good views of the green, hilly countryside from my window seat.  After reaching more than 2000 feet elevation we passed by the impressive 300 feet high Rawana Ella Falls and then climbed more steeply for the final three and a half miles through the Ella Gap to Ella, at 3400 feet elevation.  I found a hotel room on a little hill with a view down through Ella Gap and with towering Ella Rock just to the right of the gap.  After checking in, I spent about an hour on my terrace just enjoying the view under a now cloudy sky.  The air felt wonderfully cool.

Ella is a very small town, but with several little hotels catering to tourists.  About 1:30 I left for a walk about town just as it started to rain.  I got only as far as the little train station before turning back and stopping for lunch.  After lunch the sun came out and I walked back to the train station and along the tracks towards Little Rawana Falls, which I could see about a mile away, but the rain started up again, so I returned to my hotel.  Clouds previously had hovered around the top of Ella Rock and by the time I got back to my room at about 3 it was completely obscured by fog and mist.  It stayed completed hidden by fog for an hour or so and then cleared somewhat.  Late in the afternoon I took a short walk down the highway I had arrived on, with some good views down the partially cloud filled Ella Gap to the plains.

The next morning about 7 I headed to Little Adam's Peak, a pleasant walk of less than an hour.  The morning was sunny, but partially cloudy, as I started walking east on a road out of town before taking a dirt path that led through tea covered hills and finally up concrete steps to the top of Little Adam's Peak.  The total climb was only a little more than 400 feet.  From the top there were great views of Ella Rock and the plains down beyond Ella Gap.   There were also good views of the town of Ella and of a tea factory to the north above a tea covered hillside.  A couple of other hills rise to the east and I walked to them, with good views down through Ella Gap.

After about an hour enjoying the views in the morning sunshine, I walked slowly back through the tea plantation.  I got back to town about 10 and had breakfast.  About 11, with the sun still out, I started walking down the highway to Rawana Ella Falls, the waterfall I had passed on the bus on the way to Ella.  I could have taken a bus, but thought the three and a half mile walk would be scenic, which it was.  On the way I passed a turn off to the Rawana Ella Cave, where Rawana, the evil demon king of Lanka and the villain of the Ramayana, is supposed to have hidden Sita after abducting her from Rama.  The sky had clouded up just a bit by the time I reached the impressive 300 feet high falls, descending down the rock face in several steps.  It was noticeably hotter and felt more humid there than up at Ella.

I took a bus back to Ella, arriving about 1:30 under hazy sunshine.  I spent  the rest of the afternoon out on my terrace and using the hotel's computer.  After 5 I sat out on my terrace until dark, with clouds obscuring the top of Ella Rock.  The almost full moon was visible after dinner.

The next morning I had planned to climb Ella Rock, but during the night I awoke with chills and a fever.  After a restless night, I finally dug my thermometer out of my backpack in the morning and my temperature was not too high, only 99.5.  I spent most of the day sleeping, with my temperature never getting above 99.5.  The morning was clear and sunny, perfect for climbing Ella Rock.  My room was hot at midday before the sky clouded over.  It rained hard about 3 and rained for about an hour, which cooled things down considerably.  Great peels of thunder accompanied the rain.  About 6 my temperature was around normal.  I walked down the steps from my hotel and bought some water and bananas, eating maybe three of the bananas before going back to bed about 8.

I slept fine and woke up the next morning without a fever at about 5.  I got up about 6 on a cloudy morning, ate some more of my bananas, and the walked to the train station to see the 6:39 train coming from Badulla, the end of the train line, 12 miles away.  I had a big breakfast and then walked back to the train station in time to catch the 9:23 train, again coming from Badulla.  While I waited for the train, the night mail train from Colombo pulled into Ella station.  I took the train only seven miles, through pretty countryside and passing right by Little Ella Falls, to the town of Bandarawela, at 4000 feet elevation.  Bandarawela, with about 7000 people. is a much bigger town than Ella.  There's not much to see there, but I spent two hours in town, almost all at the colonial Bandarawela Hotel, dating from 1893, the year the railroad reached Bandarawela.  The wonderful old hotel had a big sitting room with polished wooden floors and interesting old photos and prints.  I walked around the grounds, sat in the big sitting room, and read through an interesting little book about the hotel and the town.

From Bandarawela I took a bus for about three and a half miles on the road towards Ella and got off at the Dowa Temple, which has a thirteen foot high standing Buddha carved onto a rock face just above the temple.  A youth group, clad all in white, from Bandarawela sat on the rocky rise in front of the rock face.  The cave temple below, with several rooms, had two reclining Buddhas and some interesting walls paintings, with more Buddhist devils devouring people, plus other figures using swords to chop up little babies while their mothers despaired.  There were a few happier scenes, too.

From the temple I took a bus to within two miles of Ella and then made a pleasant walk back to town under hazy sunshine through more tea covered hills.  I got back about 2:30 and spent the rest of the afternoon on the internet and enjoying the view from my terrace.  After dinner the moon, one day short of full, was briefly visible among the clouds.

Just before 7 the next morning I started off on the hike to the top of Ella Rock. The sun was out as I first walked along the railroad tracks from town for about a mile, with good views of Little Rawana Ella Falls, until I reached the railroad bridge near the falls.  The night mail train from Colombo, later this morning than the morning before, passed by me on the way.  Near the bridge I walked down a little path that took me under the bridge and then onto a pedestrian bridge that crossed the top of the falls.  From there I headed uphill on the other side towards Ella Rock on several little paths, getting lost only once, but soon finding my way.  I reached a tea covered hillside and above that came across a group of four Sri Lankans from Colombo with a guide, which reassured me I was on the right path.

From the tea plantation the path led into a forest of mostly eucalyptus trees, but with some other thick trunked trees, many of them scorched by fire.  An opening on the cliffside gave good views of Ella Rock above and Little Adam's Peak across Ella Gap.  The path up through the forest was steep in places, but the forest was quite beautiful, especially where the thick native trees dominated.  After a walk of a bit less than two and a half hours I reached the top, where there is a rock ledge protruding out over Ella Gap with great views, especially down below and back to Ella and Little Adam's Peak.  The view down the Gap towards the plains was very hazy.  The climb from town was just about 1000 feet.

It was hot on that rocky outcrop, but I stood out there a while to enjoy the views before taking a walk through forest along the ridge, where it was much cooler in the shade of the big trees.  I sat on a log for a while and ate some crackers I had brought and then walked back to the rocky outlook.  I spent a little more than an hour on top before heading down.  Besides the four Sri Lankans, there were maybe ten others I passed either on the way up or down.  I managed to find my way down without getting lost and reached the railroad tracks after about an hour.  The sun was hot as I walked along the tracks under my umbrella, and was not the only one to do so.  I got back to my hotel just after noon.

I drank a lot of water and ate a late breakfast and then walked to the train station at about 1:30.  I wanted to take the train to Demodara just three and a half miles north and there was a train scheduled to leave in that direction at 1:23.  I knew it would be late as it was coming all the way from Colombo, and it turned out to be two hours late.  Still, I didn't mind waiting at the little train station.  I was tired from the morning's hike and the station personnel were decorating the station for Vesak Poya, Sri Lanka's biggest holiday, which was that day.  It commemorates the Buddha's birth, enlightenment, and passing into nirvana, which they believe all happened on the same day of the year, under a full moon.   The decorations consisted of colorful big paper lanterns and lots of striped, multi-colored Buddhist flags, designed by the American Henry Steel Olcutt, who assisted the 19th century Buddhist revival in Sri Lanka.

The sky clouded over while I was waiting for the train and when the train finally arrived it consisted of only two very old and dark carriages, absolutely crammed with passengers.  Two other foreigners and I wedged ourselves in.  They had bought tickets to Badulla, the end of the line about 12 miles away, just to enjoy the view, but the carriage was so full and the windows so filthy that there wasn't much of a view to enjoy.  Fortunately, it didn't take us long to reach Demodara.  We passed a somewhat famous nine arch brick bridge, which we knew we were crossing but couldn't appreciate it, and went through two tunnels on the way.

The two others decided to get off with me at Demodara, a very small town with a very large multi-story tea factory.  At Demodara the train tracks make a loop, which is the reason I came there.  After our train left we walked to the ledge just outside the front of the station and waited for our train to complete its circle and then pass into a tunnel under us on the way to Badulla.

From the train station we had to walk a little less than a mile to the main road, where we got a bus to the road junction near Ella, and then another bus to Ella from there.  The views of the hilly green scenery were much better from the buses than from that jam packed train.  Along the way we passed all sorts of colorful Vesak Poya decorations, again mostly lanterns and flags.  We were back in Ella by about 4:30.

At nightfall two other guests and I helped the family that runs our guesthouse light and hang paper lanterns around the main house, an old tea planter's bungalow, as the full moon rose through clouds over the hills in the east.  The three main streets of the little town were lit up with lights.  There were strings and displays of electrical lights, lots of paper lanterns illuminated by candles or electrical bulbs, and even rows of little clay pots with oil and wicks.  People were strolling around to look at all the lights, and I did, too.  Later, the sky was almost completely clear, with the full moon shining brightly. 

May 6-9, 2014: Tissamaharama, Yala National Park, and Wellawaya

About 8 on the morning of the 6th I walked again to Kataragama's Sacred Precinct, passing the rows of stalls selling platters of fruit for pilgrims.  Again, lots of langur monkeys were in the trees and on the ground on the way to the main shrine and I watched them for a while.  A few of them seemed to enjoy watching me.  The Maha Devale, the main shrine, was quiet.  I walked on to the big white dagoba (stupa) beyond, where there were more pilgrims, including a group of monks in orange robes.  Walking back, I again encountered lots of langurs, between 50 and 100 of them.  I've never seen so many together.

I got back to my hotel about 10:30 and left Kataragama by bus about an hour later, getting off only about 12 miles south at Tissamaharama.  I checked into a hotel, talked with some of the other tourists there, and then had lunch.  One woman had just spent six weeks at an ayurvedic resort.  Ayurveda is the traditional medicine of India and ayurvedic resorts are numerous in southern India and Sri Lanka.  It was interesting to hear her describe her treatment, mostly oily massages and the ingestion of particularly oils.  I guess she skipped the enemas and induced vomiting.  She was positive about the experience, though said it was hard sleeping with your hair full of oil.

About 4:30 on that sunny afternoon I started off on a walk, heading first to the restored and whitewashed 2nd century B.C. Tissamaharama Dagoba on the edge of town, next to rice paddies.  I also visited a lower, unpainted brick one nearby.  For some reason about 50 crows were gathered together on the ground near the first dagoba.  They would all mass together on the ground for a few moments and then hop away.  I wonder what was going on. 

From the dagobas I walked past rice paddies, with a few ibises and egrets eating in them, to the big tank north of town.  It also is thought to have been constructed in the 3rd or 2nd century B.C.  Several men were bathing in an irrigation canal coming from the tank.  I walked along the low earthen dam on the south side, shaded by big Indian rain trees with far spreading branches.  These are particularly beautiful shade trees that I have seen several places in Sri Lanka, but can't remember seeing in India.  From the road on the dam there were good views of the hills to the north and back to the big white dagoba.  It was now about sunset and I saw a few flocks of birds, egrets and ibises, flying across the lake.  I reached the western end about 6:30, just before dark, and noticed bats flying out of the big rain trees on the tank's western shore.  I watched them until it was too dark to see them.  There were thousands of them.

At 5 the next morning a Scottish guy and I left by jeep for a day's sightseeing in Yala National Park, Sri Lanka's most popular park, famous for its relative abundance of leopards, 60 to 70 of them.  The day in the park cost us each 8500 rupees, about $65, for the jeep, entrance fee, and food.  The park entrance is about 15 miles from town, near the coast.  We were in the park before 6 on a clear morning.  From the entrance we headed generally northeast near the curve of the coastline, following a maze of dirt tracks through the low, scrub vegetation, with some trees and rock outcrops.  It is a scenic place.

We first spotted wild pigs, and then saw some spotted deer.  There were lots of birds, too.  Particularly interesting were the bright blue and green little bee eaters that tended to fly right in front of our jeep.  Early on we saw leopard tracks in the thick dust of the road.  The drivers communicate with each other with cell phones, and when our driver was alerted about a possible leopard sighting, he sped along the bumpy tracks to get to the location.  Eventually, there were about 15 jeeps gathered there, but no leopard, or at least not one visible.

We also saw lots of crocodiles and some water buffalo.  In one big pond there must have been 30 crocodiles.  I enjoyed just bumping along the trails, enjoying the scenery and spotting animals and birds.  We saw three different mongooses (mongeese?) over the day, two of them very close and seemingly not too disturbed by our presence.  In the past the mongooses I have seen have quickly run into the brush and disappeared.  These mongooses had dark fur, with possibly a few spots, not the reddish brown fur of the mongooses I saw in India.

The jeeps with people on only morning safaris (the majority) left about 9.  About 11 we had our first sighting of a leopard, though only a couple of fleeting glimpses.  I first saw it moving into the brush.  A bit later I saw it moving through the brush, not very close to us.  I trained my binoculars on him and got a good view, though only for a few seconds, as he reached a little gap in the brush and then disappeared. 

We drove around some more and got a good close up view of an elephant eating by the side of the road on our way to our lunch spot, near a river, where we arrived about 12:30.  The area was shady with a breeze and langurs eating fruit in a tree.  We spent about two hours there before starting off again.  We soon came across several elephants eating noisily in the bushes.  Two babies were among them.  The elephants didn't seem too concerned by us.  In fact, at one point three or four big ones huddled together right next to our jeep.  I noticed they had dirt on their backs.

We drove to a pretty little beach with a rock outcrop on the shore a little further away.  The sun was still out but dark clouds were massed further along the coast, to the southwest.  From there we hurried to the site of another leopard sighting.  Two of them were napping in trees, but far away.  You could really only see them with binoculars.  One was difficult to spot in the gloom of the tree.  The other, in a different tree, was a bit easier to spot, but you could only see his backside as he slept on a big branch.  Perhaps more interesting were the tactics of the 20 or so jeep drivers, most from afternoon safaris, as they jockeyed for position to give their customers pretty unsatisfactory views of a leopard.  While all that was going on, I noticed a big rabbit emerge from the bushes and appear briefly to watch all the commotion.

We left the scrum of jeeps and came across and a mother and baby elephant.  Heading back to the entrance in the late afternoon we passed wild pigs, spotted deer, and lots of birds, and we had our best sighting of a leopard.  He was in bushes by the side of the road and soon emerged onto the road itself.  There was another jeep in front of us, however, and the leopard was walking in front of that jeep, so mostly we got a view of its backside.  They are very graceful animals.  I took several photos and had my camera ready for a photo when he turned his head back, but our clueless driver started his motor at that instant and I missed the photo.  The leopard disappeared into the brush.

A bit later we came across a jeep stopped by a five or six foot long python lying across the road.  It lay in a straight line, with no curves in its body.  We watched for a while and it didn't move.  Perhaps it was getting some last late afternoon warmth from the road before nightfall.  Eventually, the lead jeep nosed up to it and the snake wiggled across the road and into the brush.  We saw another, shorter, python on the road just beyond the park entrance.  We left the park at 6 and got back to town after dark.  After a long day, I was in bed soon after 9.

The next morning I started a walk about 7:30.  The sun was out, but there was a breeze as I walked out of town and past rice paddies to another ancient dagoba, the Yatala Dagoba, surrounded by a low wall with sculpted brick elephant heads and a lotus filled moat along the wall.  Water drops sat on many of the lotus pads, sometimes in arcs.  Next to the dagoba ground was being broken for the foundation of a new temple building and breakfast for the big crew of volunteer workers was being served nearby.  I was invited over and given a cup of sweet black tea, plus a plate of "milk rice," made of rice and coconut milk, with a spicy vegetable topping. 

After talking with the friendly people there while I ate my breakfast, I walked to a nearby ancient monastery of which nothing remains but several dozen uneven stone pillars.  A wedding party was in the ruins for photographs.  The bride wore an elaborate traditional dress, plus lots of jewelry and make-up.  Her maid of honor and two little flower girls wore purple dresses.  The men all wore western suits and ties, which looked uncomfortable in the morning sun.  The groom was all is white, while his best man and two little flower boys, as they were described to me, wore black.  I got to talking with the best man and took some photos of the kids while the bride and groom were being photographed.  The groom then called me over to be in a group photo.

I walked past the ruined monastery to another dagoba and then turned back, passing a school on the way opposite the construction site.  A lot more people, including some of the white uniformed kids from the school, were at the construction site now.

I walked to the southwest end of the lake and sat under the big rain trees where I had watched the bats the night before.  A fishermen in a little outrigger canoe was on the lake, among the vegetation.  When he got to shore I spotted lots of fish on the bottom of his boat.  I then walked over to the big rain trees on the tank's western side, many of them submerged by the shallow water at the edge of the tank.  Several big trees were filled with bats, many of them screeching.  A few flew short distances before finding a new place to hang from the trees.  I watched for quite a while.  There were thousands of bats.  I walked a bit further north, but by now it was nearing 11, so I walked back to the hotel, where I spent the early afternoon except for a lunch break. 

About 4:30 I set out on another walk, past the Tissamaharama Dagoba and the rice paddies to the tank's southeastern corner and then along the dam to the southwestern corner.  It was about 5:30 by the time I got there.  I walked to the area with all the bats in the trees.  Hundreds of egrets and ibises had already alighted near the tops of some of the more distant rain trees.  Towards sunset the sky filled with birds, mostly egrets and ibises, coming to roost for the night in the trees.  They came in flocks and swirled through the sky around the trees before alighting in the trees for the night.  Occasionally a group, after alighting, would take off again and then alight again.  Soon three or four big rain trees out on the lake were dotted with white egrets and ibises.  I had seen black cormorants all together in a different tree.

As the birds were arriving, there were only a few bats in the air, but then as it was getting dark and most of the birds had found a place for the night, at first hundreds and then thousands of bats filled the air, taking off from the rain trees where they had spent the day and heading off to search for fruit.  They all seemed headed south, at least initially.  I craned my neck and watched them till it got dark.  A half moon and two bright stars, perhaps planets, appeared.  By about ten minutes to 7, after 20 minutes or so of masses of bats in the air, only the last few were taking off, and I headed back to my hotel in the dark.

The sun was out when I woke up the next morning, but there was a light rain falling by the time I left Tissamaharama by bus at 9:30.  I was heading only about 40 miles to the north, to the town of Wellawaya, but it took me two and a half hours to get there on two very full and slow buses, first an hour's ride to Tanamalwila, and then on to Wellawaya.  The route I traveled is considered the dry zone, but it was green and humid.  The sun came out on the way.  Nearing Wellawaya the terrain became a little hilly.  Wellawaya, at 600 feet elevation, sits at the foot of the mountains.  They rise up just north of it.  

I checked into a small hotel in a rural area about a half mile south of the bus station and had a big lunch before taking a bike from the hotel about 2 and heading south to see the sights.  The sky had again clouded up, with ominous black clouds clustered against the mountains to the northwest, but I decided to risk getting rained on.  The bike was a rickety old thing, with bad breaks and a too low seat that shifted back and forth, but it worked out all right and I enjoyed biking through the countryside, with lots of greetings directed my way by the local folks.

I pedaled south down the not too busy main highway about two and a half miles and then took a road to the west that soon became a dirt road on the way to Buduruwagala.  Greenery was everywhere, the sky was cloudy and threatening rain, and the air very humid.  It certainly didn't seem like the dry zone.  Buduruwagala, nestled in the hills, is an archeological site with seven giant figures, believed to date from the 10th century, carved in low relief onto a rock face.

The central figure, more than 50 feet high, is Buddha.  To the left are three figures maybe half as tall.  The central one, retaining much of its white painted plaster and a red halo, is believed to be the boddhisattva Avalokitesvara, with an unidentified figure to the left and a bare breasted Tara to the right.  These figures are somewhat unsual because they are prominent in Mahayana Buddhism, but not the Theravada Buddhism practiced in Sri Lanka.

To the right of Buddha is another cluster of three figures.  The central figure is Maitreya, the future Buddha.  On the left is a figure believed to be Vishnu while on the right is a figure, believed to be the Tibetan boddhisattva Vajrapani, holding a thunderbolt symbol important in Tantric Buddhism and again quite unusual in Sri Lanka.

The area is secluded with a grove of trees in front and jungle all around.  Only two other people were there when I arrived and soon left.  Two other local people stopped by while I was there.  I spent about an hour there.  The sky was dark and thunder rumbled in the distance, but it did not rain.

I biked back to the junction with the main highway, where I spent a few minutes in a museum, and then biked south along the highway another two and a half miles or so and then east on a bumpy road another two and a half miles or so before reaching the Handapanagala Tank.  I got there about 4:30 under dark skies, but still no rain.  I spent about an hour there, biking first up onto the embankment and then parking my bike and walking on the little path atop the embankment, with the water to the north and beyond hills and more dark clouds.  A few small fishing boats were out on the water.  Reaching the eastern end of the embankment, I then climbed the rock hill just beyond, ascending about 150 views for some good views out over the water to the north and over the plains to the south.  The sky was still very cloudy.  Wild elephants are said to come to the tank to drink at times, particularlly in the late afternoon, but I saw none.  I did see some not too old elephant dung. 

I walked down and back to my bike and it took me about 45 minutes to pedal back to my hotel.  The way back was a little uphill and because of the approaching nightfall and the threat of rain I didn't make any stops except to buy some water.  A few raindrops began to fall, but it didn't really rain.  My shirt, however, was soaked through with sweat by the time I got back.  I drank about a liter and a half of water.  Dinner was a big rice and curry Sri Lankan meal, with chicken, pumpkin, beans, dhal, beets, and a sort of salad.  The food was delicious and even though I ate none of the beets, which I don't like, and dhal, which I am tired of, I couldn't finish all of the other dishes.  I went to bed under a fast moving fan while sleeping under a mosquito net, but knowing the next night I would be in the cool hills.

May 4-5, 2014: Uda Walawe National Park and Kataragama

The morning of the 4th was cloudy in Tangalle.  About noon I left on a bus headed inland north to the town of Embilipitiya through green countryside first on the main coast highway and then on pleasant narrow roads with relatively little traffic.  The trip took about an hour and a half under darkening skies, with a heavy rainstorm as the bus neared Embilipitiya.  The rain, however, stopped before the bus reached Embilipitiya.  I had come to Embilipitiya to visit Uda Walawe National Park, about 15 miles distant.  With such rainy weather, however, I decided not to go into the park that afternoon, but wait until the morning.  I checked into a hotel and arranged a jeep for the next morning.  There's not much to do in Embilipitiya, at about 250 feet elevation, and so after lunch I headed to an internet cafe.  There was some more rain in the late afternoon, but a light rain.

My jeep picked me up the next morning at 5:30 and we headed toward the park north of town.  The jeep rental was 3850 rupees, almost $30, so I was disappointed I couldn't share it with someone else.  The park, with Sri Lanka's biggest concentration of elephants, is situated around a large reservoir.  On the way to the park entrance, while driving on the long, low earthen dam that creates the reservoir, we spotted our first elephant, a lone male.  He had somehow gotten himself on the narrow strip of land between the reservoir and the wire fence on the dam and was happily munching grass.  Beyond the reservoir appeared the mountains of central Sri Lanka.

We arrived at the entrance soon after 6 and spent about three hours in the park.  The entrance fee was another 3700 rupees, about $29 (locals pay about 50 cents), so it was an expensive safari.  I didn't see very many other jeeps, maybe five to ten.  The morning was cloudy and cool and there were lots of puddles on the muddy roads in the park.  The landscape is mostly low scrub, with some trees, but all very green now after the rains.

We spotted another lone male elephant near the entrance.  Only about 10% of Asian elephants have tusks and neither of the two males we had seen had them.  He walked away from us and then turned as if to charge, but only momentarily.  My guide, picked up at the entrance, yelled at him.  He turned away and used his trunk to scoop us some dirt and spray it onto this back, for insect relief, I think.  Shortly thereafter, we spotted a mother and baby elephant and a little later a group of six in the bushes.  The high density of elephants and the low scrub makes it fairly easy to spot the elephants.  I saw about 30 all together in the three hours I was in the park.

After watching the six elephants eating grass and branches of vegetation, we drove on and spotted a group of about 15 elephants, including females, juveniles and babies, and watched them for quite a while.  Two one month old babies were in the group and stayed huddled under their mothers.  This group was especially fun to watch, as there were so many of them, plus the two little babies.  Elephants are noisy eaters.  An adult eats something like 450 pounds of vegetation every day.

We headed further north into the park and spotted another five or so elephants together.  A little later we came to a large pond with about 50 water buffalo submerged in the water.  At the far end of the pond swam a lone crocodile, not bothering with the water buffalo, at least for the moment.  All the water buffalo were adults, so maybe they were too big for the small crocodile.

Besides elephants, I also saw lots of birds.  One egret was perched upon the back of a water buffalo submerged in the pond.  There were also lots of storks, including the colorful painted storks.  And there were more peacocks and peahens than I have ever seen anywhere.  They were all over.  Our jeep approached one peacock standing in the center of the muddy road.  It didn't flee at our approach,  but about 20 feet in front of us decided to display his feathers.  He gave us the full visual effect to five to ten minutes, turning around several times and every once in a while shaking his feathers, which I suppose drives the peahens wild.  The only thing is that there seemed to be no peahens around, only our jeep.  The long display was wonderful to see up close.  When he finally closed up his brilliant tail feathers and we drove past him, he let the jeep get within about five feet of him, which is very unusual in my experience with peacocks in the wild.

We drove along and came across three big water buffalo wallowing in a tiny, muddy pond.  Later I caught a brief glimpse of a mongoose skittering through the bushes.  Then we again came across the group of 15 elephants and again watched them for a long time.  One of the great things about Uda Walawe is that you were watching animals almost all the time.  Usually in game parks in India you spend most of your time searching for the animals.  Two of the juvenile males occasionally tussled with each other, using their trunks to entangled and push each other.  That was interesting to see.  The elephants moved into and out of the bushes they were eating, so there were always some to see, and sometimes you could see all 15.

At one point I heard a repeated thumping noise and wondered what it was.  The guide stood up and many of the elephants huddled together over the babies.  Apparently a jackal was nearby, which the guide saw.  The thumping was an elephant trying to scare it away.  Later, with our jeep parked, a female came out of the bushes and passed within five feet of the jeep seemingly without any concern.  Her baby (not one of the one month old ones) was following her but elected to skirt the jeep by quite a bit more before cuddling up to his or her mother.

I was sorry to have to leave the park after three hours.  On the way back to town we encountered a heavy deluge of rain.  I had transferred from the open back of the jeep into the cab just before it hit.  Unfortunately, that let me observe that the jeep did not have operating windshield wipers.  The driver said his child had broken them, and he apparently didn't find it worthwhile to repair them.  The rain stopped before we reached Embilitiya and in fact in town the streets were dry.

Upon my arrival at the hotel a wedding procession was making its way to the banquet room, with three or four young men in fantastically embroidered white costumes and hats.  Another onlooker told me it was a Kandyan wedding.  The young men paused at the doorway of the banqueting hall and didn't enter until after being sung to by several young women in purple dresses.

I ate breakfast and then took a bus about noon southeast to Hambantota on the coast, a trip of about an hour and a half under cloudy skies and some rain.  Approaching Hambantota, the hometown of Sri Lanka's megalomaniac president, we drove through a seeming maze of mostly empty four lane highways passing a big brand new conference center and a big new administrative center on the way into town.  Signs pointed to a big brand new airport and there is also a new port.  Hambantota itself didn't look like much, and upon arrival I almost immediately left on a bus headed northeast inland to Tissamaharama, an hour's journey.  The scenery was now much less densely vegetated, with some thorn bushes, though still green.  I had passed beyond the dense jungle of Sri Lanka's southwest coast to its drier southeast coast.

From Tissamaharama I took a bus a bit more than ten miles north to the even smaller town of Kataragama.  While on the way, the bus was boarded by a graying, middle aged woman with a pink tee shirt that read "Yes I'm a Bitch But Not Your Bitch."  I have seen some amusing tee shirts in this part of the world.  I remember a ragged fisherman in Kerala with a tee shirt proclaiming "Life is a Disease - Love is the Symptom - Death is the Cure."  Another guy somewhere in India wore a tee shirt with a line drawing of a hirsute Jeff Bridges and the legend "The Dude Abides."  My favorite, though, was a guy somewhere in India with a tee shirt stating "Whoever Doesn't Lie to Women Has No Regard for their Feelings."  I wonder if those folks had any idea what their tee shirts read.

I arrived in Kataragama about 3:30 and got a room in the very nice rest house for Bank of Ceylon employees.  The sun was just coming out, at last.  About 4:30 I ventured out and it began to rain, but quickly stopped.  I walked through the quiet little town toward the Sacred Precinct, an area sacred to Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims alike, across the river.  On the way I walked under big, leafy rain trees and paused to look at the fruit stands that sold big platters of colorful fruit to be taken to the temples in the Sacred Precinct.  Five or six big hornbills with yellow beaks flew directly overhead.  Three or four of them alighted on electrical wires and a lamppost, so I got a very good look at them.  Several more were hopping or flying through nearby trees, or just sitting in them.

I crossed the bridge over the river into the Sacred Precinct and first encountered a closed Hindu temple and a Muslim shrine with a couple of small mosques and a couple of graves of holy men.  A friendly guy in a skull cap and neck brace showed me around, pointing to three palm trees, now thirteen years old, growing from, he said, a single coconut.

I walked down a wide sandy path, passing cows and about 50 langurs sitting together, to the Maha Devale, the main temple of the area.  Inside the wall of the compound are three little temples, the main one, on the right, to Kataragama, whom Buddhists consider a guardian of the Buddha while Hindus consider him to be the son of Shiva and brother of Ganesh, known in India as Skanda or Murugan or Subramanian or Kartikiya and probably several other names.  The main temple and the one next to it, honoring Ganesh, were closed.  The only open one, honoring Buddha, was very simply decorated.  I wandered around the sandy compound area, with two big leafy trees in the back with langurs in them.  I had arrived there about 5:30 as the compound began to fill up with pilgrims, most clad all in white, carrying platters of fruit for the 6:30 puja.   

By 6:30, just as it was getting dark, there were six of us foreigners and maybe a couple of hundred Sri Lankans gathered out in front of the Kataragama Temple.  The doors were now open and a woman told me to go inside and I followed her.  People, mostly in white and several with platters of fruit, crowded into the colorful little temple.  A puja about 45 minutes long began.  I stuck through until just before the end, though it was very hot and humid inside the crowded little temple.  A drummer and a guy with a foot long oboe-like instrument played away while an obese priest all in white with a white cap officiated.  A red carpet was rolled out, offerings under colorful fabric brought in, and then the carpet removed.  A couple of very intense bell ringing sessions came and, thankfully, went.  I finally left to join the bigger crowd outside in what felt like marvelously cool air, and the ceremony apparently ended just as I left.  The curtain hiding the inner sanctum was never lifted. More people started filing in with more platters of fruit.  I had been hoping to see the frenzied kavadi or peacock dance (Kataragama is usually pictured riding a peacock), but it didn't happen.

As people were filing in and out with platters of fruit, a man gave me a small sweet banana from his platter.  Another gave me a banana and a piece of watermelon.  A third gave me a big dollop of sweetened rice on a sort of plate of leaves, plus a slice of an apple.  I was hungry and appreciative, and even ate the whole sticky rice concoction as I walked around.

In front of the three temple are two stones behind low metal enclosures.  Worshipers prayed in front of them while holding coconuts above their heads and then smashed the coconuts against the stones.  They very  forcefully hurled the coconuts against the stones, as it is considered inauspicious if the coconut does not break.  Some of the coconuts (their husks already removed), were lit on fire during the prayer.  When the fire burned itself out, the coconut was then hurled against the rock.  The area around the rocks was full of broken coconuts and emitted an unpleasant smell, perhaps of fermenting coconuts.

In the dark I walked with others to a lit up white dagoba (stupa) a ten minute or so walk away, and then came back, reaching my hotel about 8:30.  I was tired, had a quick dinner from the hotel's buffet, and went to bed soon after 9, sleeping for about ten hours. 

April 30 - May 3, 2014: Mirissa and Tangalle

In Galle on the morning of the 30th, I walked up to top of the town's southern walls looking over the ocean soon after 6:30.  The tide was low, the sun was out, and a good breeze blew off the ocean.  I sat for a while and watched the ocean and a guy net fishing out between the rocks, and then made a slow clockwise walk along the walls to the big bastions facing the land side to the north.  The morning seemed much cooler than previous ones.  I'm not sure if it was cooler or if I was just slowly acclimatizing to the hot, humid weather. From the north bastions I walked through the town's streets to the lighthouse on the bastion at the southeast corner of the walls and sat near there for a while.

I ate another of Mrs. Wijenayaka's big breakfasts about 10 and left Galle by bus about noon.  I got off the bus at the little seaside town of Mirissa, a little more than 20 miles to the east, after a journey of about 40 minutes.  On the way, we passed Unawatuna Beach on its sheltered cove only about three miles east of Galle.  Further along the coast we passed several poles, with foot and hand holds, sticking out of the sea right along the shore. None were manned, but fishermen use them when conditions are right.  Finally, we passed another cove, a larger one with the town of Weligama along its shores.  Mirissa is just east of the eastern headland.

I got a nice room in a grove of palm trees not far from the beach and then took a walk along the beach inside a pretty little cove.  The beach is lined with guest houses and restaurants, most low rise, but with two big ones, one already built and the other under construction.  I suspect this pretty little beach will soon be overwhelmed as they say Hikkaduwa and Unawatuna are now.  The sky darkened and there was a little rain about 2.  I sheltered in a coast guard facility right on the beach that had several sea turtles, including green, hawksbill, and loggerhead, in cement tanks.  You could see them well, especially as they would swim right up to you in expectation that you would feed them, which happens three times a day.  I spoke with a friendly coast guard officer who told me he had been in the Navy at Jaffna during the civil war and asked me what I thought of human rights in Sri Lanka.

At the eastern end of the beach is a small island with some poles used by the stilt fishermen.  The rain had stopped but the sky was cloudy all afternoon.  The waves were impressive.  Quite a few foreigners were swimming or lying on the beach or in the beach side restaurants.  I headed back to my hotel in the palm grove for a while before returning to the beach about 4:30.  The sky was cloudy, with little breeze off the ocean.  I watched the turtle feeding at 6.  They were fed little pieces of cut up fish.  On the beach nearby are a few areas when turtle have lain eggs, with the dates and number of eggs written on little boards.  After dark I had a good fish dinner in one of the beach restaurants facing the ocean.

I was up the next morning at 5:30 to be picked up at 6 for a whale watching expedition that left promptly at 6:30 from Mirissa's harbor, full of colorful fishing boats, west of the headland.  There were about 30 of us on the double deck 50 foot long modern boat.  The trip cost me 6000 rupees, about $46, but with a money back guarantee if we didn't spot a blue whale, the biggest creature ever to inhabit the globe.  We headed south into the Indian Ocean on a sunny, calm morning and soon turned east, traveling quite a ways out along the coast for about an hour and a half where we encountered several fishing boats and a troop of about ten, maybe more, spinner dolphins.  We were somewhere near Dondra Head, Sri Lanka's southernmost point, a little south of 6 degrees north latitude.

After just a short while watching the dolphins, who swam away from us rather than towards us, we headed south out to sea for almost two hours into the shipping lanes that round Sri Lanka.  These two shipping lanes are two of the world's busiest shipping lanes, with 200 to 300 ships passing every day.  We saw several big cargo ships, including one that passed us very close by.  Unfortunately, the shipping lanes coincide with the blue whales' migration route, and an estimated 15 to 20 whales are killed every year by ships.  Our captain, a shaggy haired young guy wearing a white captain's hat, had a photo of a piece of a whale still impaled on the bow of a ship.  The estimated 200 to 300 blue whales that frequent the area are estimated to produce only about 15 offspring each year, so they are barely holding their own.  The whales come this way because the continental shelf near Mirissa is particularly thin, with an underwater canyon nearby that produces an upwelling of food for the whales as they pass.  The whale boaters are trying to get the shipping lanes moved further south, but with no success so far.

About 15 nautical miles, or 17 statute miles, south of the coast, one of the crew spotted the spout of a blue whale and we headed for it.  Soon we could see the whale's back, with its distinctive very small dorsal fin.  It spouted water several times while never emerging much from the water.  Blue whales reach up to 100 feet in length (and almost 200 tons in weight), but we saw only a small portion of its back until it raised its tail above the water and dived.  Typically, they dive for 15 minutes or so and then emerge for 2 to 6 minutes.  Our whale, however, was apparently curious about our boat and emerged close to our stern after only six minutes or so.  It half circled the boat and then swam under it.  Our captain said it was a juvenile, longer than his boat.  It came up again and again half circled the boat before lifting its tail and disappearing under water. Further off, another, larger blue whale's spout was seen.  The captain thought it might be the mother of the first one we had seen.  He said the young ones are the most curious, or maybe just mistake the boats for their mothers.

We never got close to the larger whale and after about a half hour in the area headed back towards Mirissa. Of the half hour, I think less than half the time we actually were watching the whales rather than the ocean, and then we saw only a thin slice of their backs and finally their tails as they dived.  Still, it was nice to see the world's largest creature at one of the few spots, maybe the only one, where it can be easily spotted.

I enjoyed the two hour trip back to Mirissa, with a view of the coast in front of us, including the Dondra Head lighthouse to the east.  We arrived in the harbor about 12:30.  It was sunny and hot on land.  I had lunch at a beach side restaurant and then came back to my room, where I took a nap despite the afternoon heat.

Sometime after 4 I took a bus about six miles to the east and the larger town of Matara.  I got off the bus in front of the minuscule Star Fort, not more than a hundred feet across, built by the Dutch in 1665, and named Redoubt Van Eck, according to the old plaque above the entrance.  It has a working drawbridge, which the attendant raised for me, and a large crocodile in its cement moat.  

From the Star Fort I walked across a modern bridge over the Nilwala Ganga (the word for "river" in Sri Lanka appears to be "ganga") as it makes a loop along the coast before entering the ocean.  Just over the bridge on a long peninsula between the river and the ocean is the area called Fort, with Dutch built stone ramparts across the neck just west of the bridge. I walked through the battered gate, dated 1680, and spotted a bunch of boys in Islamic dress, some in white robes and almost all in skullcaps, playing cricket on a lawn.  Behind them on the lawn were four Russian made tanks on display.  Friendly soldiers were covering them with a tarp for the night.  None of them spoke much English.  I looked over the tanks, watched the boys play cricket, and then walked through the streets to the west, with a few colonial era buildings here and there.

Eventually I made my way back and to the waterfront just outside the ramparts.  Lots of people were frolicking on the beach to the east and there was a tsunami memorial on the waterfront.  Just offshore is an island with a Buddhist temple reached by a short bridge.  I spent a while on the waterfront and bridge enjoying the breeze.  The sun had gone down just behind some palm trees on the shore to the west, with the trees outlined with a red glow.  After dark I took a very crowded bus back to Mirissa.

The next morning I took a walk along Mirissa's pretty beach, with big waves crashing on the sand.  About 10:30 I took a bus east to Matara and then another bus further east to Tangalle, about a 30 mile trip.  The bus passed by Dondra Head and arrived in Tangalle about 12:30.  I got a hotel room right on the beach and was the hotel's only guest.  The area seemed deserted until several Sri Lankan wedding parties, with very loud music and women in some beautiful clothes, got going.  I searched for an open restaurant and finally found one and had a rice and curry lunch in a family house with another tourist who had found the spot before me.

I spent most of the rest of the afternoon on my breezy second story hotel terrace in front of my room.  The day was hot and sunny.  About 5, after it had clouded up and cooled down, I took a walk along the long beach stretching to the east.  A couple of palm trees grew almost horizontally over the sand toward the ocean.  Big waves crashed against the beach.  The sun set inland, with massive clouds out over the ocean.  Walking back just before dark, I noticed a crescent moon over the land to the west.  At night I fell asleep to the pleasant noise of the big waves breaking just across the narrow beach side road from my room.

The next morning was cloudy and a misty rain fell for a short while during breakfast.  About 9 I took a bus to the town of Beliatta about five miles inland to the west, and then another bus less than ten miles north to Mulkirigala, a temple monastery less than ten miles from the coast but set in a hilly, palm filled jungle.  The green scenery along the little country roads on the way was pleasant.

I had to walk about a half mile from the bus stop to the 300 or so foot high cliff upon which several cave temples are located.  Some of the cave temples date from the 3rd century B.C., but all were completely restored in the 18th century.  The sky was still cloudy, with some rain, as I walked up stairways through the four rockside terraces to the top of the rock.  The first terrace had a couple of rock caves, now looking more like little rooms with walls at the cave openings.  Inside were reclining Buddhas and very interesting wall paintings, with elephants and gods and kings and queens and other people, some apparently being devoured by devils.  Macaque monkeys played in the trees just off the first terrace.

A long flight of stairs led to the second terrace, with one cave temple with a reclining Buddha.  Just above is the third terrace, with four cave temples with, you guessed it, reclining Buddhas, and interesting wall paintings.  One of the caves had carved wooden pillars and a big chest in which ancient manuscripts were found in the 19th century.

Steep stairs, including some cut into the rock face, led up the final hundred feet or so to the top, with a small dagoba (stupa) and wonderful views down to the hilly, palm filled countryside.  I sat on the exposed rock at the top and enjoyed the views and the strong breeze under cloudy skies.  I had about a 180 degree view from north to south, with black clouds to the west.  The wind increased markedly and I figured rain was on the way, so I headed back down.  It did rain as I revisited the cave temples on the way down.

I had spent about three hours there and then walked back to the bus stop.  My umbrella broke as I was putting it away.  I bought a new one for all of three dollars from a friendly shopkeeper between buses in Beliatta.  From Beliatta, rather than head back to Tangalle, I decided to take a bus south about seven miles to Wewurukannala, with a 1960's very high statue of a seated Buddha, with a seven story building as his backrest, next to a temple.

One of the buildings in the temple compound contains a sort of Buddhist Chamber of Horrors, with full size figures of devils sawing a sinner in half, boiling another in oil, and spearing others. Other figures, including a monk and a woman who had apparently committed the sin of dancing, are being submerged in pits of fire.  The walls of an adjacent long corridor are covered with dozens of garish paintings. On the top level are depictions of various sins being committed, though it was usually difficult or in fact impossible for me to figure out what sin was being committed.  Below each painting of a sin being committed is a painting showing the gruesome punishment in hell for the particular sin shown in the top painting.  I saw a couple of families taking their very young children along the corridor.

The main hall, dating from the late 19th century, was full of much more benign figures, some giant.  I sheltered there during a heavy rainstorm before a long wait in a gentler rain for a bus back to Beliatta.  While waiting I noticed an elephant in the grove of trees across the road and next to the temple.  I got back to Tangalle about 6, with light rain still falling.

I ate dinner in the small restaurant just outside the house of a man who told me he had lost all his family, his mother, father and brother, in the 2004 tsunami.  He told me he had left the family house on the shore just five minutes before the tsunami hit at 9:15 in the morning to go into the town center, and that saved him.  I had earlier seen a tsunami memorial to a man with a German name near the beach.  The tsunami killed about 30,000 people on Sri Lanka's eastern and southern coasts, including about 1000 who were on a train heading from Colombo to Galle which was swept out to sea.

April 25-29, 2014: Aluthgama and Galle

On the sunny, hot morning of the 25th I took a city bus to Colombo's main train station and bought a ticket for the 10:30 train south along the coast to Aluthgama.  The train arrived at 11 and was packed.  All seats were filled and the aisles were jammed with people.  After walking along the platform the length of the train, I decided I would take the bus instead.  I walked to the nearby bus station and left on an uncrowded bus at 11:30.  The 35 mile trip to Aluthgama took over two hours.  Traffic in Colombo was congested and slow, and the bus passed near my hotel about two hours after I had set out for the train station.  I could have walked a block and a half from my hotel and caught the bus there.  It must have taken more than an hour to get through Colombo and its suburbs.  I had a few glimpses of the ocean as we headed south.

In Aluthgama I got a room in a private house on the pretty lagoon created by a river, the Bentota Ganga, just before it empties into the ocean.  About 5, after lunch and an internet cafe stop on a hot day, I walked across the bridge over the river, with a welcome breeze off the lagoon to the west, south to the town of Bentota just on the other side.  This is Sri Lanka's premier beach resort area.  Just over the bridge are two Geoffrey Bawa designed hotels.  I walked past the Bentota Beach Hotel to the Avani Bentota Hotel and walked onto its palm filled, grassy grounds.  The hotel building itself is a low rise, two story, long building whose dominant feature is a high sloping red tile roof, which fits very well into the landscape.  Black clouds hovered inland over the palm trees to the east.

I walked through the grounds to the beach, considered a golden sand beach, though the sand looks more beige to me, with some orange or brown or red, depending on the sunlight.  The beach is wide and long and very nice. Waves crashed offshore.  I walked north along the not very crowded beach until after sunset, a magnificent sunset in a sky full of enormous clouds.  Black clouds still hovered to the east inland, but only a few raindrops fell.

Walking back along the beach just before dark, I entered the grounds of the Bentota Beach Hotel.  The main building is designed to resemble a four story wooden pagoda.  On the second story is a large room that is a bar with big windows facing west.  The room is air conditioned, quite a change from the very humid air outside, and smells wonderfully of cloves.  I sat there for a while and then walked through an inner courtyard with a pool (not for swimming) surrounded by frangipangi trees to the reception area, with a ceiling covered with spectacular panels of colorful batik designs of animals, insects, and flowers.  The reception area, too, was air conditioned and redolent of cloves.  I walked over the bridge and back to Aluthgama in the dark, with a few stars out.

The next morning about 8 I started off on a walk across the bridge, through the clove scented Bentota Beach Hotel, and south along the beach to a headland, topped by a big, unattractive hotel.  The morning was sunny and warm.  After about an hour of walking, I retraced my steps and on arrival back in Aluthgama had a big breakfast on the grass terrace of a hotel fronting the lagoon, with a bit of a breeze off the water.

Towards noon I took a slow bus south about 15 miles, with few ocean views, to the town of Ambalangoda, where there are two shops that sell Sri Lankan masks.  One has a sort of museum attached to it, which was interesting but terribly hot, humid, and stuffy.  I was dripping with sweat while inside.  The museum displayed the 35 masks used in traditional Sri Lanka devil dances, rarely performed now but in times past used to rid people of diseases caused by devils.  Each devil was responsible for a particular disease and had to be propitiated with dancing and offerings to persuade it to leave the ill person in peace.  Another set of masks were used in a theatrical piece about a pregnant queen and her husband the king.  The masks were very interesting.  In a nearby area one guy was carving a mask and a woman was painting another one.  In the shop hundreds of masks were on sale.

I caught a faster bus back to Aluthgama, arriving about 2:30, and headed to the clove scented, air conditioned bar of the Bentota Beach Hotel, where I happily spent most of the rest of the afternoon reading while sitting on a comfortable sofa.  Outside the air was hot and soupy.  I did spend some time in the reception area looking over the spectacular batik panels on the ceiling.  About 5:30 walked down to the beach and stayed until after sunset.  There was no rain until later that night.

The next morning was cloudy, with some sun and some rain.  I ate another big breakfast facing the lagoon and then before 10 left on a bus heading south to Galle, something more than 30 miles away.  The bus ride, with some ocean views, took about an hour and a half.  When the bus stopped, it was oppressively hot inside.  We passed through the beach town of Hikkaduwa, famous in the 70's, but now it looks terribly overdeveloped.  Rain fell just before we reached Galle, but stopped just before arrival.

Galle was Sri Lanka's premier port until the port at Colombo was improved in the late 19th century.  Some have linked it with the Biblical Tarshish, from where King Solomon obtained gold, spices, ivory, apes, and peacocks, though I've read others have located Tarshish in Spain.  In any event, near the southern tip of Sri Lanka, it has a long trading history.  The Portuguese first appeared here in 1505 and built a fort in 1589.  The Dutch captured the fort in 1640 and in the 1660's expanded the fort to include the whole of Galle's sea facing peninsula.  The peninsula is less than a half mile from north to south, and even shorter from east to west.  The three high bastions facing north, the land side, are particularly impressive   Built in the 1720's by a particularly tyrannical Dutch governor, who was later executed in Batavia (now Jakarta in Indonesia), they are named, from west to east, the Star, Moon, and Sun Bastions.  There was only one small entrance into the fort just east of the Sun Bastion until the British in 1873 cut a larger entrance between the Moon and Sun Bastions.

All Galle is divided into two parts:  the wonderful old colonial town inside the fort and the modern town to the north.  From the bus station I walked through the 1873 entrance through the walls and down a narrow, almost traffic free little street to a hotel in the large family house of Mrs. Wijenayaka about a block from the southern wall of the fort.  The day was cloudy, hot, and humid, and it was high noon, but I took a walk around the old town.  Lots of tourists were out and about and I enjoyed walking through the narrow streets lined with colonial buildings.  I suppose Galle's eclipse as a port by Colombo may have saved its colonial character.  In recent years lots of foreigners have bought and refurbished many of the old colonial buildings and the whole area inside the fort has a wonderful colonial feel, more than any place I've ever been in Asia.  The overwhelming majority of the people inside the fort, though, are Sri Lankan, and there are schools and shops.  It's not a large area, something like 90 acres in total.

Walking around town, I entered the 19th century Anglican church and, just up the street, the mid 18th century Dutch Reformed church, with its floor covered with finely carved old stone tablets with death heads and family crests and names and birth and death details in Dutch.  These memorials were moved to the church when the British closed the old cemeteries in town in the mid 19th century.  The church interior isn't decorated much, but for the organ loft, a wooden canopy over the pulpit, and some wall plaques, the most unusual of which held the small baptismal dress of the man it memorialized

The sky had darkened before I entered the church and it rained briefly while I was inside, which cooled the air a bit.  I also visited a couple of now very fancy hotels in old buildings, one set in a former gem merchant's mansion and the other originally built for the Dutch Governor in 1684 and converted in 1863 into the New Oriental Hotel, Galle's most fashionable colonial hotel.  Both had wonderful verandas and high ceilinged rooms inside, beautifully decorated.  The latter had some wonderful old maps on its walls.  In the former rooms go for about $200 a night; in the latter $600.  My room at Mrs. Wijenayaka's cost me about $15 a night.  Budget hotels are more expensive in Sri Lanka than India, as are expenses generally.

I walked to Court Square, filled with big, leafy rain trees, some now entangled with banyan trees, and surrounded by several lovely old court buildings and very small lawyers offices.  It was quiet on a Sunday afternoon save for guys playing cricket in the paved square.  I watched for a while.  Sri Lankans seem to be particularly good cricket players and the country is one of the world's cricket powers, despite having only 21 million people compared to, say, India's 1.3 billion.  I also walked by the huge former Great Warehouse, now converted into an almost worthless maritime museum.  It is a long (maybe 250 feet long) barn-like, two story structure through which the old gateway into the fort passes. It is painted yellow with black shutters and formerly held ships provisions and valuable trade commodities.  Its eastern end is near Court Square and its western end near an old building with a veranda and columns that holds the post office.  The whole area within the fort is just a wonderful place to wander around, with little traffic.  It was especially quiet on a Sunday afternoon.

I had lunch about 2 and then walked around some more.  Near the southeast corner of the walls is a mosque built about 1900 that looks like a church but for the Islamic symbols, such as a half moon, where the cross might be above the doorway.  The sun came out every once in a while, but there were still lots of clouds in the sky.  About 5 I began a walk along the fort walls, starting at the lighthouse at the southeast corner, with views across the harbor to a rocky peninsula to the east.  The bastion at this point is called Point Utrecht, and from there I walked west along the top of the walls to the next bastion, built upon Flag Rock, the southernmost point of the fort.  Big rocks litter the ocean below, with waves crashing among them.  In places I could see coral through the clear water.  A man was fishing with a net among the rocks and waves.  From Flag Rock I walked northwest and then north, passing several other bastions and lots of people out for a late Sunday afternoon stroll, until I reached the massive bastions protecting the fort from the land to the north. I climbed Star Bastion on the west and then walked across to the central Moon Bastion, which now has a 19th century British built clocktower and a big Sri Lankan flag flying from a high pole.  From the bastion there were good views of the town inside the fort, with the Anglican and Dutch Reformed churches particularly prominent.

The sunset, however, was rather drab, as massive clouds hung over the ocean to the west.  I sat on the Moon Bastion for a while and then walked back the way I had come, reaching Flag Rock just before dark.  It rained during dinner and after dinner I again climbed up to Flag Rock where I could see the clouds occasionally lit up by distant lightning out over the ocean.

The next morning was sunny, quite a change from the day before.  About 7:30 I walked to Flag Rock and then headed along the top of the walls northwest and then north to the massive bastions on the fort's north side.  There was a bit of breeze off the ocean, but I was sweating before 8.  I walked along the tops of the northern bastions, hot under the sun, and then descended and left the fort via the 1873 gate, passing an open air fish market next to the harbor, and returning to the fort via the smaller original gate.  Lots of traffic on this Monday morning was passing into the fort via this gate.  Court Square, a block from the gate, was filled with people and with cars parked in the square, which had been empty the day before.  Among the crowds were lawyers in black suits and ties.  It made me hot and uncomfortable just to look at them in their suits. The courts seemed already busy.  The array of small lawyer offices, filled with typewriters, stacks of papers, and ceiling fans, had clients in them.

From Court Square I walked up and down the fort's streets, with few tourists this early in the morning.  About 9 I returned to my hotel where I had a great, and very big, breakfast, in the family dining room while one of Mrs. Wijenayaka's relatives or helpers prepared a wedding cake mixture with dried fruit inside the batter.  Breakfast included woodapple jam, whatever that is.  It was good.

After breakfast I walked around town some more, visiting some of the shops full of antiquities and a private museum full of old stuff that is adjacent to a gem shop, full of a fantastic array of gems and jewelry.  I came back to the hotel after noon and spent the hottest part of the afternoon there, using the internet and talking with the other guests.

About 5:30 I headed to Flag Rock..Big black clouds filled the eastern sky behind the lighthouse and big white mosque.  The fisherman with a net was again out among the rocks and waves.  Further out I could see big cargo ships, some heading east and some west.  There were clouds to the west, too, but the sun descended through a gap in the clouds until it disappeared just above the horizon.  The sunset was much more colorful than the cloudy day before and I stayed up on Flag Rock until after dark, when raindrops finally persuaded me to leave.  After dinner I came back.  The cloud filled sky to the west was frequently illuminated by flashes of far off lightning.  Only once did I see a bolt of lightning, reaching from the bottom of a low hanging cloud to the ocean.  The thunder seemed to arrive about fifteen seconds after the lightning, and then was faint, because of distance and the crash of the waves below the walls.

I had planned to leave Galle the next morning, but decided to stay on an additional day in that very nice place.  The early morning was cloudy as I walked to Flag Rock about 7:30.  I watched the ocean from there a while and then walked around town until about 9.  I think I eventually covered every street inside the fort and there were often interesting places here and there.  The people are very friendly, too.  The sun came out as I was walking around.

After another big breakfast at my hotel, I spent most of the day, there, using the internet, reading, and talking with the interesting and friendly Mrs. Wijenayaka, now a great grandmother, and the other guests.  I also read the newspaper, a pro-government paper with a paranoid, nationalistic outlook that sees the West (and they are especially upset about Canada) as trying to destabilize Sri Lanka out of jealousy at its success.  All this is because of the government's continued hard line stance toward the minority Tamils after the horrendous civil war that lasted from 1983 until 2009.  Buddhist Sinhalese make up about 73% of the country's population, while the Hindu Tamils comprise 17%.  The rest include Muslims and Christians.  Sri Lanka's thuggish President Rajapaksa is a strident Sinhalese nationalist who is obviously very upset with the calls for war crime investigations arising out of the civil war.

About 4:30 I headed out to Flag Bastion and walked back and forth from there to Triton Bastion to the west, sitting every once in a while.  The sky had clouded up and there was a good breeze off the ocean, so it was pleasant up on the walls.  I could see big cargo ships out near the horizon and fishermen among the rocks below.  Big black clouds were stacked up to the northwest and over the rest of the afternoon moved to obscure the sunset.  Still, the billowing dark clouds made for a dramatic scene over the ocean.  I walked along the walls to the big north bastions and then walked through the town just before dark.  After dinner I went up to Flag Rock again.  There was no lightning to be seen, but the night air was filled with the crash of the waves below.