Balangoda - Maskeliya
Sri Lanka, 2018
In the morning it was sunny and hot. During the night someone (either a bird or a chipmunk) ate our bananas that we had left on the balcony. So we ate the oatmeal just with condensed milk.
Originally, we wanted to get to the village of Nallathanniya, from where the trail to Adam’s Peak begins.
The road was winding, very narrow, and had sharp turns. When we met a bus on the way, we had to come to a complete stop and pull over to the shoulder, as the bus takes up the entire road. It’s good that there is very little traffic here; buses are rare.
Road in the mountains among tea plantations
But what a picturesque road this is! Of course, I knew that tea is grown in Sri Lanka, but I didn’t expect it in such quantities! There are mountains all around here, and tea grows on all the slopes. You can easily walk among the tea plantations if you want to. It’s even cooler than the vineyards in France and Italy.
Tea Hills
Tea
Flowering Tree
After lunch, dark clouds covered the sky again and a light drizzle began. There are almost no villages along this road. So when we reached a small village, we decided to stop for a bite to eat and rest, since the opportunity presented itself.
The café sold delicious pies. We ordered tea with pies. The pies turned out to be surprisingly tasty and varied. Not sweet at all, very fragrant, with different spices.
While we were drinking tea, a heavy downpour started. We were glad we had stopped at the café at just the right time. The rain did not stop completely, but by the time we finished our tea it had eased noticeably. We set off again. The rain would intensify and then let up a little, though not for long. At one point it started pouring again, and we took shelter under the porch of a house.
When the rain eased once more, we rode a little way back along the road to where we had seen a sign advertising tea for sale. The tea was sold in a strange half-abandoned building. There were several kinds of tea here. We bought a kilogram of tea. And then the rain came down again.
Across from the building where tea was sold, we saw a tuk-tuk bread van. In Sri Lanka, there are tuk-tuks that have been converted so that behind the driver, instead of seats, there is a transparent “cabinet” for bread.
Apparently this was the tuk-tuk’s home, where it was “refueled” with fresh baked goods. We bought some more buns in this tuk-tuk. The tea seller brewed tea for us. We ate buns with tea and waited for the rain to let up. The buns were simply delicious, still warm, sprinkled with sugar. So we had to run back out into the rain for more :)
But it didn’t let up. Evening was approaching. We didn’t want to ride in the dark. There were still 28 km to the planned village. So we finished our tea, thanked the kind seller, and continued on.
The downpour began. We were soaked to the skin. It’s cold on a moped in wet clothes.
In the nearest village, 5 km away, we still couldn’t find a hotel. We had to ride another 8 km through the downpour to the next village.
In the village of Maskeliya, we finally managed to find a hotel. They put us up in some kind of semi-basement room. It smells a bit like sewage here. But there is hot water. All our things are wet. I don’t know how we’ll ride tomorrow in them; they definitely won’t dry here.
