This was a trail that I was looking forward to do since I have done the other two main routes previously (Palabathgala & Hatton). All started when we met on 21st of march where I got to know many members of Lakdasun out of them Amal who is a member came up to me and asked me “are you planning to do the Uda Maliboda trail?” so that was the initiative for this journey! :-).

This was a trip we went to see the waterfalls near Sinharaja border. The crew is consisting of different age groups. We leave Colombo in morning and reach Neluwa in afternoon. First we went to see the “Kosmulla Dhuwili Ella”. For this you have to take left turn at bridge over Gin River about a kilometer before Neluwa town. This waterfall has three levels and there are steps leading to top of the waterfall. So we climbed to the top.

Batalegala Kanda, situated in Kandy, and visible as you reach Kadugannawa Pass is shrouded in thick jungle from time immemorial. If you love Sceneries and want a one day hike Bible’s rock is a good place to be, we did climb this special rock few months back. It took us only 12hours to climb it and return back to Colombo.

We met an elderly person and asked about climbing the Lakegala mountain. He said that season is not good for climbing Lakegala because of the strong wind. But we were not in a mood to give up the idea of climbing Lakegala. That night we camped in the jungle near Memure village. And it was a terrible night, because of heavy wind our tents were going to crash. We had to hold the tent most of the time.

Actually this was an official journey to Mahiyanganaya but we planned it out to perfection. We took the 11.45pm bus to Mahiyanganya (the bus was packed @10.45pm) and the journey was a long one and we never regretted the night journey because the road trough Hunnasgiriya was heavily under construction these days. After the bus tackled the 17 hair pin bends, it was time for us to get down at Gurulupotha. The time was 5.30a.m so we decided to have breakfast at a nearby Tea shop and started our journey towards the Seetha Kotuwa ruins at Gurulupotha (the path starts near to the Rest house).

In the morning we got into a Hatton bus at around 9AM and reached Ginigathhena around 11:30AM. From there we haired a van to Koththellana. We had our lunch and started to climb from Koththellana area. First you have to go through tea plantation and then pine trees. After that there’s no clear path, you have to go by making a path trough the bushes. And that is the difficult part since the way is very steep. Some times you need ropes to climb. But on the way we saw some elephant dung.

Let me start by explaining about “Wangedigala”, Im sure all of you must be wondering where the hell this is. This is a mountain range situated close to Kalupahana and facing the Badulla A4 road. it came in sight of my attention for the first time when I visited Bambarakanda falls, since then I wanted to climb it because it was a mountain range that you can walk along and enjoy the view. But actually we wanted to go further than Wangedigala. Balathoduwa and Gommolli(13th highest) was our target.

That was last May, one of my closer Moratuwa University friend Tharanga(At present he is a Civil Engineer in Singapore) sent me an e-mail mentioning that he would come to Sri Lanka for his vacation & please find a real place for resting & stress releasing as he was very busy with technology in heavy construction sites at Singapore.

It was Independence Day so we decided to get in to the wilderness and enjoy our day. We started our journey form Colombo at around 8.30am(planned time was 6.30am 🙂 and when we came to Kitulgala it was already 12 noon. After buying lunch we came to the famous bathing spot behind the rest house to cross over the Kelani river, the sight was unbelievable their were like million Homo sapiens. Anyhow we crossed over to the peaceful opposite bank and the charge was 20/= per person.

This time we got it all wrong we got in to a Badulla bus from Colombo and without getting off at Balangoda we got down from Pambahinna and had to take a three-wheeler up to Mulgama which was about 18Km but never the less the journey through the Samanala Wewa forest part was a totally different experience, we also had a stop to enjoy the view of Samanala Wewa. On the way to Mulgama We noted a huge water-flow across the road which was leaking through the mountain, now this is the famous leak of Samanala project, as we heard this water leak runs through a mountain which borders the reservoir.

We started from Colombo at 3.00 in the morning. Had morning Tea at Hanguranketha at a Friend’s place then visited the first Waterfall of the trip – Katugasoya Ella which is along the B413 road at 30km post. Can go to base of the falls in 1 minute going through a private land where a guest house being constructed.
After this on the way to Walapane We stopped at Andawala Ella Which is also right by the road along the Hanguranketha

We had reserved the Bambarakanda rest as our accommodation. After picking everyone, we left Kottawa around 2 in the morning. Stopped by somewhere around Avissawella for a tea and collected some short eat items from there. We were at Bambarakanda rest by 6.30 in the morning. It was nice to see the sun rise and Bambarakanda falls washed by morning sunlight.