After a bit of a heavy night this morning found us heading down the mountain passes trying to hang on to our breakfasts. Once again our driver was in rally mode swerving here, there and everywhere. We stopped for a break at Ella Waterfall and watched monkeys grooming sleeping dogs by the side of the road. The views were breathtaking and after 4hours we were once again at about 200 meters having dropped some 1600 during the morning. After a late lunch we entered Y...

After a wonderful drive up winding roads we arrived at a tea plantation and visited a tea factory. Watching the process take place we arrived at the and of the production line and had confirmed that they use the dust from the process to make teabags! Continuing our drive even higher we reached Nuwara Eliya and the wonderful Grand Hotel built for the colonists and little changed. High tea followed by a walk in the towns markets where we bought vanilla pods. We end...

Have sent this again as wifi was rubbish this morning. Having trogged around many temples and stupa (I'm stupafied!) during the day, the magic moments often occur in the evenings when we seem to congregate together and swap stories of previous adventures and amusing moments. There is rarely a moment of silence before someone chips in with a new dimension, joke or anecdote which has us all in stitches. We leave each other to attend to sore feet, bites and aches an...

Visited the temple today. No idea how many steps but last nights beer made it hard work for us all. Soaked through by the time we got to the top and it was only 9.30! Barefoot time again, padding over the hot stones, hatless, showing respect to some 138 Buddha's. Shod again we began our way down when one of our party went over on her ankle and fell. It looked broken but after being carried down and a visit to the hospital Jeanette rejoined the party with a bad sp...

A visit to the ancient city of Polonnaruwa built on the edge of a huge man made lake started our day this morning. Some of the lakes date back to their 11c construction and are absolutely huge. They feed the surrounding paddy fields and supply irrigation for miles around through largely original canals. The jungle claimed the City in the Middle Ages and it was rediscovered by the Brits in the 1930s. We trekked around in the heat of the day like mad dogs (well, ha...