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Published: June 22nd 2017
Geo: 6.95764, 80.6771
No sleeping on this tour. We had a rude awakening at dawn by a troupe of monkeys using the corrugated iron roof of our bungalow as a spring board across to the trees. It sounded more like a herd of elephants! What I love about the Cinnamon Wild Hotel is that being on the edge of the National Park there is all sorts of wildlife in the grounds. One night we saw a buffalo and her baby in the bushes. This morning there was a Monitor Lizard on the path. At breakfast a Giant Squirrel made a quick foray in to try and grab some food. The lovely Langur Monkeys hang out in the trees. On the island in the lake we have seen crocodiles, pelicans and various birds and on the path out to the main road we had two jackals running in front of us. Our morning mission was to drive to Kataragama a good hour's drive away. This is a very holy place because the Buddha came here on his 3rd visit and sat in a chair and taught his philosophies. When he left a Giant White Stuppa was built around the chair sealing it in
forever. We had to park in the street in the town and walk in to the shrine. There are hundreds of brightly coloured stalls selling baskets of fruit and flowers as offerings to the Buddha and obviously lots of faithful Buddhists buying them. At the entrance is a place to keep your shoes for a small fee and then it is a long walk to the Stuppa. The ground is flat and sandy so not too bad on the feet. At the Stuppa there was a procession of people doing prayers. There is a square of 28 previous Buddhas. They are still waiting for the next one who is due in about 2000 years. After visiting the Stuppa we walked back down to the temple itself and it was quite a performance to get in. There was lots of bell ringing and important people coming and going. Eventually we had the white mark put on our forehead and got in. Unfortunately as I was expecting a lovely big golden Buddha, it was disappointing as the inside contained very garish murals which looked more like an advert for a Bollywood movie than a temple. We did not have time to visit
the Hindu temple which may have been better as we had to head back and as I have said previously driving from A to B takes time. We had a light lunch of beer and frites before heading off into the park for another 4 hour safari in a jeep. Different jeep and driver today. Sadly we did not see the leopard but we did see lots of elephants and my favourite view was of two elephants walking towards each other and greeting each other by wrapping their trunks round each other and stroking each other's ears- really sweet. There were lots of babies of buffalo and boars. At one point a dog foolishly came up to a buffalo who just tossed it into the air a couple of times with it's horns and we never saw the dog again. I do not know how the dog got in as pets are not allowed. There are however hundreds of dogs around, all the same mongrel type which wander around freely all day. There were also lots of birds to be seen in the park and we were lucky that both our driver and guide spotted lots of birds for us
which I am sure other people in jeeps never got the chance to see. It was time to get back and change for dinner and a bit of socialising. This is the busiest hotel we have been in so far and I would highly recommend it. At first we both thought 3 days was too much but soon agreed it was just right. The following morning we set off at 9am heading north to hill country. On the way we stopped at a house which has a barn which had two lovely owls roosting there. We left the flat expanses of paddy fields surrounded by coconut palms and wound our way up into the hills toward Nuwara Eliya. We had a brief stop at some waterfalls which were on the main road and I bought a lovely rock off a man who only wanted to be paid in English coins. We stopped in Ella for a great lunch at Cafe Chill a very popular place with back packers as it is fun and cheap. Finally we saw a sign to Jetwing Warwick Gardens, our hotel. However I thought we must have taken the wrong road as we proceeded along a
narrow very uneven rocky track and our driver did not like it at all but we could not turn back as it was so narrow. Eventually we arrived at the hotel or rather at an old garage! However we walked down some stairs to a lovely old colonial building once owned by a Brit Tea Plantation owner. It is like stepping into a lovely Victorian house with antiques and old prints on the walls. This is set in a lovely flower garden with views over the hills. We were booked in for 2 nights but decided one would be enough as we could not drive back and forth along the impossible road. Apparently it had rained every day for the past 3 months and had destroyed the road. The place was so elegant that we changed for dinner and came down for drinks in the drawing room. Apart from 2 Chinese girls who stayed in their room we were the only people in the place which is so quiet. Viji, had welcomed us with a cup of tea, brought down our luggage, sorted out a few electric problems with the room, served us drinks in the drawing room and served
us the set menu for dinner at the long elegant dining table with lovely flower arrangements which of course he had also done. It was a lovely meal washed down with a couple of bottles of superb rose wine but so quiet that we kept whispering to each other as if we were in a library. We tried to get into another Jetwing hotel for the following night but they were all booked up so we will have to pay for an extra night elsewhere. Nice place if it wasn't for the road but even then one night would be enough as there is nothing to do, no pool, no Wi-Fi and not so much hot water. I noticed a leech in the toilet pan and we managed to flush it away. However it obviously survived and crawled back up and got Stefan on the thigh the next morning. Having been "leeched" a couple of times myself in Australia we knew what to do and I got some salt water from Viji and this did the job of getting it off with no damage done apart from a slight loss of blood. Once again we were treated to a Downton
Abbey style breakfast in the dining room which was beautifully presented. Sadly despite the lovely service and food I cannot recommend the hotel for the many other reasons outlined above.
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steve cole
non-member comment
That looks very colonial.