LORD OF THE MINDS

Pinnawala "The Elephant Orphanage"

From the airport, upon exit we directly headed towards Pinnawala en route to the first night stop at Kandy, a small hill station in the central province of Sri Lanka. After a sumptuous lunch of the famous Sri Lankan rice and fish curry, we reached Pinnawala, known for its huge Elephant Orphanage at about 2:30pm. At the entrance after the first left, you see a couple of small elephants breaking wooden logs. These were the chained ones and so tourists were freely taking photographs with them. One of the elephants actually flung a log at us while we were taking pics with him. The place borders a hill and has a river on the other side where the elephants are taken for daily bath. So we visited that river bank next. What greeted us was a massive sight. 50 odd elephants bathing at the side of the river and workers throwing water on them. Beautiful! The best part was the child elephants who jostled past the elders to move at the head of the pack when they came marching back to the orphanage. Brilliant!

A hill station, Kandy is comfortably located in the central province in Sri Lanka. It is a quite town, compared to the hustle bustle of Colombo. When we reached it was already dark and we were getting late for the temple visit. So instead of checking into the hotel, we headed towards the Temple of Tooth Relic. Temple of Tooth Relic is a Buddhist temple famous for Lord Buddha's tooth which supposedly travelled from Kalinga to Kandy and is a antique item here. The temple hallway has the story about this along the hallway. At the end of the hallway is the statue of Lord Buddha. When we entered the temple, it was time for the evening prayers. So all the drum players started the rituals along with the head priest who had the candles. Very similar to Hindu temple rituals. After offering our prayers, we finally headed to our first stay of the journey, Hotel Hill Top. True to its name, it was situated on top of a hill and we were lucky to get a city view room. The room was very well made, the dining area was beside the swimming pool & since Christmas was closeby, the entire hotel was decorated with christmas trees & presents. We finished our day with a sumptuous sri lankan rice curry meal & some evening dance beside the dining area.

We reached Nuwara Eliya around dusk. The first stop on the way was the strawberry farm named Adman's. Located on the horton plains road, the farm had a small shop alongside selling dishes like strawberry pancakes, juice, cake etc. So after some clicks inside the covered area, we ordered for a strawberry pancake at the shop. Boy, was it delicious! Absolutely filling, the pancake had strawberry sauce & ice cream inside which made it superb. We were absolutely delighted as we headed towards our stay, Hotel Heaven Seven. Located just off the road, this hotel was on the road up the hill. And as expected, the room opened up to the view of the hills. Truly breathtaking. After checking in, we left for temple hopping & shopping in the local market. There was a Hindu temple nearby where we offered evening prayers. But just as we headed into the market, it came pouring down. With no umbrellas & slight cold setting in, we decided to call it a day and headed back to our hotel. A candle lit dinner of steak and fish and we retired to our rooms content.

Now, this was my 5th snorkelling experience so I was calm, but Samragni was experiencing her first. Me and the guide were on both sides of her pulling her into the sea. We crossed about 2 groups of blue, yellow, green fishes and then it came. We saw a huge turtle. It was bigger than me and furiously swimming towards us. The guide had some bait so the turtle was onto us. As I was brushing its shell, Samragni became scared seeing its head close by. And by this time, the entire group of swimmers had come on our side seeing the huge turtle. Some experience. As we swam back, we had some story to tell. Mr. Sisira then guided us towards a shack hotel which was owned by a friend of his. They treated us to shark soup and fish noodles. With a beautiful sunset and an exciting story to tell, we headed back towards Colombo.