29th April - Kandi to Nuwara Eliya

Ayabowan from the roof of the world - Nuwara Eliya,

After our massive second day, we went back to the buffet room and had an ordinary breakfast buffet. I felt sorry for the hotel as Vish told us that they only had three reservations for tonight...oh well, it will hopefully bounce back.

We decided not to check out the tooth temple, but went to the viewpoint and got a good pic of Kandi Lake and the surrounds.

We have a lot of say what we see on this tour and Vish is pretty cool with that. We told his that we are interested in nature, gardens, plants, animals, food etc.., and not so much temples and buildings. He then took us to the Kandi Botanical Gardens and we spent three blissful hours looking at some of the best palms and some of the tallest trees that we've ever seen, I'm not sure if the pics will do it justice, but do any pics ever do justice to botanical gardens??

Now I though we were pretty high up at Kandi, but the elevation was ONLY 500 metres. Our final stop for the day was the mountain town of Nuwara Eliya - elevation 2000 metres!!

Our first stop was a buffet lunch (Lankan's love the buffet) at on incredible restaurant

perched on the edge of the world - elevation 1000 metres. We were seriously the only ones in there and the buffet could have fed 100. We sat at an open door that looked out over tea plantations, waterfalls, houses, and market gardens. The rain started and it was mystical man!

Vish then snaked his way even further up the mountain, but you know, I was pretty much ok with it. There were no sheer drops, but shops, villages and people the whole way up.

We went to the Damro Tea Factory on the top on the mountain and Jen and I were shown around by a very knowledgeable woman as we saw all of the rooms and learnt about the process. These skin and bone Tamil women (only women may pick) pick the top two leaves and the uncurled leaf of each tea bush every day and pick 20 kilos a day! The jobs are passed down to their daughters... fuckin' hard life that has made a select few poms very fuckin' minted. Anyhoo had a cup of English Breakfast - official name BOP and it was ok.

Why are people so unkind? Dilmah Tea - endorsed by Kamahl.

We then drove even higher to the San Francisco Guest House in Nuwara Eliya. This was a Swiss style chalet that actually was on top of the world. It was so high, but still surrounded by the most lush vegetable market gardens. On the side of the road everywhere,you see these dirt-poor farmers (mostly Tamil) that sell their wares in ramshackle wooden stalls. The carrots, beans, leeks, cabbages, eggplants, strawberries etc, looked world class.

I said to Jen, that I think Sri Lanka is just one big market garden, as every spare lot is planted with something or bananas and coconuts grow wild. We actually love this place. :)

Vish then drove us into the proper town centre of Nuwara Eliya and there is an entire town with all amenities at 2000 metres!!

We walked around part of Gregory lake - a natural lake that spans a few kilometres and saw lots of families enjoying themselves, dickheads on jet skis and lifejacketed passengers on tour boats. The grounds were impeccable (of course) and the vibe was very chilled - apart from the afore mentioned bogans of the waterways - jetskiers!

The main allure of this town and the place that Vish was keen to show us was the Grand Hotel. Queen Lizzie stayed here in 1954 and they haven't quite gotten over bragging about it. We pulled up to a grand circular driveway through manicured exotic gardens where doormen opened the car door and led us on a tour of the hotel.

It was the bomb. Indoor swimming pools, gyms, billiard room with a set of original ivory balls (kept under glass) multiple dining rooms, bars, conference rooms etc... all old-school grandeur. The spirit of colonialism is alive and well in this joint.

We sat in the bar after our tour and had a few bevvies while we listened to some yuppie pommie wankers, I mean bankers talk about their building projects around the world?? Anyway 4 beers and two wines in the poshest of the posh came to, wait for $22 AUD!

We had told Vish no more buffets earlier in the day due to burgeoning waistlines, but one more would be ok in the Grand Hotel right.

Yep!

I was lucky that at the last minute I threw on my collared skull shirt before we left, but my jeans were packed away in the other suitcase, so I had my trusty khaki Rip Curl shorts on.

"No problem Sir, you can eat here but you must wear a sarong to cover your knees."

Ah, that old chestnut...

"No worries."

For the next hour or so Posey McPoserton a.k.a. Grandude swanned around the Grand dining room of the Grand hotel in a rather grand yellow and black sarong, and looked, well Grand!

How can something sarong feel saright?

Anyway to the buffet.

We started with salads and TFT (Thai Fruit Trifecta - as there is no more SMR) before we visited the individual stations and I saw some lamb being cooked. I wasn't too excited as the lamb was thinly sliced (about 1 cm when cooked) and there seemed to be a lot of bone and fat. It was also covered in a herb and salt rub and served with a brown diane sauce. I asked for some and the kid gave me one piece. I politely asked for a second and then went via the herb and garlic mashed potato bain-marie to complete the new trifecta.

Herbed mash, lamb and diane sauce - probably the greatest mouthful of food I've ever eaten! No word of a lie. This shitty looking lamb, was of course mutton, which is older and tougher but has at least three times the flavour of our spring lambs in Oz.

This was incredible. I went back two more times and made this kid serve me! Haha! Hey, I was paying and this is what I wanted.

Another significant part of the meal was the wine. Now dear readers, you may remember that Grandude hasn't had any red for while but they had a Tuscan DOCG on the menu and we split the bottle. It was amazing. We finished off by demolishing various coloured sugar filled deserts, that all tasted the same, but looked very pretty.

We also dug the keyboard player - complete with loop station - murdering classic soft rock tunes as he was ignored by the crowd. I slipped him 1000 rupiah and a wink as we departed. Our hearts always go out to muso's that are largely ignored by the ignoramii, as I always give buskers and muso's some cash. My final grand gesture, one could say!

We then drove back to the Alpine lodge and told Vish what a grand dude He was for suggesting this place.

The night, however, dear readers was far from over. The boys were playing Carrom - a game like pool on a small board where you flick the counters into the pockets - and had beers on the go. Well Jen and I retrieved some libations from the suitcase and spent half an hour with them, losing badly at Carrom.

The temperature up this high has dropped and the doona on the bed was half a foot thick. Needless to say, we slept like lamb filled logs.

What a way to spend Friday!

Grand!