Little Adams Peak and Ella train ride

We had an early start as we wanted to climb Little Adams Peak this morning. We met some cool people in our hostel the night before and we all decided that we’d meet outside at 5:30am to start the walk. From looking at Maps.me it would only take about 45 minutes so we’d be just in time for the sunrise at about 06:20. It was me, Tom, Meredyth, Christophe and Filipa (the girl who stole my bed yesterday) who got up and got hiking. Me, Filipa and Christophe at the front exchanging stories and talking about our own counties, Tom and Meredyth at the back as they are both brummies presumably talking about Peaky Blinders. We made it up to the top of Little Adams Peak in really good time and we had been told to go to the third hill along for the best view. It was very undulating so we went down and up and down and finally back up to our sunrise spot with nobody else around except a couple of dogs. We waited for the sun to rise. It was a little cloudy, which actually made it more spectacular! We tried to get a few group pics with a timer but it didn’t really work. So I had a go...timer set to 10 seconds and I ran back on top of the rock we were getting the pic on. It was a heart stopping moment when I lost my footing and nearly plummeted down a couple of thousand feet! It made for a good picture, and made everyone else laugh except Tom who I grabbed onto to save myself!

After appreciating the sunrise it was time to head down for our free breakfast at the hostel, some simple eggs and toast would do. A few people were going to get the train to Nuwara Eliya, however as we were going there in a few days we decided to still get he train but get off randomly and see what was what. We got to the train station with Filipa and Meredyth and got some second class tickets for just 165 rupees (70p) to a stop called Ambewela. The German couple Jen and Matthias were also on the platform so we all piled on the train getting various seats and Filipa and Meredyth got the classic door view where you could hand out and enjoy the fresh air. I basically became Filipa’s private photographer as she dared to hang far out of the train, she did the same in return for me, however it’s so awkward getting these pictures when there’s a thousand tourists and locals watching. Tom would have taken part but he was trapped behind this large Sri Lankan man who’d swapped seats with him so he could look out the window. Filipa and Meredyth hopped off at Haputhale to go and do the Diyaluma Falls we’d done previously and we stayed on with Jen and Matthias to Ambewela. We got off at this station in the middle of nowhere to go to this farm. We bartered down a ride to what we thought was the right farm...turned out it wasn’t the one Jen thought. It was called New Zealand Farms, and was a massive dairy farm. Predictably there was a ticket counter, I spotted it was 100 rupees from afar so confidently put the money through the hole to the man. He pointed to a separate sign in tiny writing saying that it was 200 for foreigners...outrageous!! We went in and walked into the first shed where there were loads of goats...we were so excited as you could pet them all and there were baby goats all over! From here we went to see the milking station, the calves, pregnant cows, bulls and rabbits (which were being sold for either meat 😕). By this time we’d seen everything there and headed back to the entrance to try and get the same cab back to the station only 3km away. However, the number he gave us didn’t work so we got someone else to take us. We got back to the station to wait for the train. Awkwardly, the man who took us there was waiting and kept following us around...really weird. We grabbed some bits from the little bakery which was amazing and got our third class tickets back to Ella for just 65 rupees (27p).

The train was jam packed of people coming from Nuwara Eliya so we had to stand, which was ok as we were near the door so had some air. The locals near us at the door whooped and whistled each time the train went through a tunnel. As it was so full we all had to just manoeuvre ourselves at each stop to let the locals either on or off. Eventually we made it back to Ella and said goodbye to Jen and Matthias whose Tuktuk had been moved from where they left it, they offered a lift but we felt like a walk so made it back to the hostel. Once back we freshened up as we were still in the same clothes as climbing Little Adams Peak. Filipa made it back and was keen to go get dinner with us, so we got ready and went up to the part of town we were the previous night. We had fried rice, Filipa and Juliette (a French/German girl) shared a rice and curry and whilst eating Tom and I realised that it was 3 years ago today we met, HAPPY FRIENDAVERSARY.

We all went to 360 bar where we heard some live music from some people in the hostel. We saw the most disgusting thing, a leech full of blood on the floor wriggling around and leaking the host blood. It was awful and it was massive!! We headed back to the hostel as we were getting up in good time tomorrow to climb Ella rock. Filipa who was trying to do Ella in 24 hours was coming with us, but had a flight out of Colombo tomorrow at 6pm, we’d see how far she’d get...Read more