This is an isolated village completely surrounded by numerous mountains making it located in the bottom of a deep ravine. Badulla-Passara road seems to be running around this and a few other isolated villages. Namunukula-borne Loggal Oya flows between the border of Urumeethenna, the last village with main-line-supplied electricity, and Kohonawala before joining the mighty Mahaweli at Mahiyanganaya, making it further isolated.

The story behind the start of this village has many different variations. According to the folklore, they origins run far deep thousands of years backwards where the indigenous people of SL, the Veddhas, roamed this island at will. According to one old farmer, the leader of that Veddhas in the village was an elite archer. Once he won a contest of shooting an arrow through a golden ring thus getting the name “Ranpath Mudiyanselage” bestowed upon his clan. Surprisingly all the people in Kohonawala has that as their surname to-date. Everybody is called R.M. and their given name.

By February of 2012 I had climbed Adams peak 6tims using all 6trails. Since my initial plan was to complete all 6trails and once this objective was achieved I decided to retire from climbing this peak. But this decision to retire only lasted a few days because as soon as I downloaded my GPS data of the Hapugastenne trail to my computer I found out that there are 2more possible trails that could be done

We decided to do this trip in two days and planned to stay the first day night in a small hotel near Wilpattu junction and to start the safari following day early morning. So on first day we started our journey from Gampaha at around 2 p.m. and reached Puttalam at about 5 p.m. where we stopped near the lagoon for a break.

Following day we all got up early in the morning and had a cool dip in Kumbukkan oya and then packed our stuff to go. We started the journey as early as possible so that it would definitely help to avoid the burning heat. For the day three, our target was Navaladi hot water wells. Very first group crossed the river at Madamethota and thereafter no one was allowed crossing from there due to high water levels.

සිංහල ජනතාව අතර “කතරගම දෙවියන්” යන නමින් ද හින්දු ජනතාව අතර “මුරුගන්”, “ස්කන්ධ” යන නමින් ප්රචලිත කතරගම දෙවියන් පිළිබඳ ජනප්රවාද රාශියක් තිබේ. කතරගම දෙවියන්ගේ උපත පිළිබඳව විවිධ මතිමතාන්තර තිබේ. ඉන් එක් මතයක් වන්නේ ඊශ්වර හෙවත් ශිවගේත් පාර්වතියගේත් පුතකු ලෙස ස්කන්ධ කුමරු උපත ලද බවයි.

We have been planning for a long weekend by taking Monday 3rd Feb, off – day before National day – but were not sure of our destination. Going through the options we decided on a scenic drive to Deniyaya via Buluthota Pass since we have never taken that route. We also added Lankagama waterfalls and Kanneliya forest to our list, as all these attractions were new to us.

We all were big fans of hiking, photography and nature. It was 8.00am when we reached food city, Matale where we bought supplies for our stay at “Wana niwahana” We bough salmon, rice, dhal, spices, cheese, biscuits and water.

Sri Pada Season is begun. Buddhist pilgrims and pilgrims of other religions come in millions to worship the sacred foot print. People who want to climb the summit within a shorter period without much difficulty choose the Hatton Nallathani Route. Because of that Hatton route get crowded most of the time. People who wanted to climb in less crowded trail which is much closer to nature; choose comparably difficult Eratna or Ratnapura trails .

It’s very unusual of me to visit the peak wilderness twice within one year but 2013 was a special one. Suddenly out of nowhere the idea popped out and I called my better half and agreed her to join me this time and as usual few lakdasun members answered my calls. I was so happy because Kasun and Sri were joining us, so we won’t feel lonely with their company. I have been through both Rathnapura and Hatton trails but I have not ascended from Rathnapura and after almost 5 years the trail was said to be totally different than the one I knew previously.

After passing Yatiyanthota we stopped at Ingiriyawatte to see the hanging bridge. According to villagers this is the longest hanging bridge of the country with a length of 360 feet. There was another hanging bridge between Kalugala junction and Bodiragala junction.

We reached the Pahiyangala Temple around 6.30am and it was a fine morning with lots of cloud cover and sun fighting to pierce through them to lighten the world. We climbed the steps to the cave complex. Though there were only about 100 or so steps to climb, it was still a bit hard to swallow in the morning and we were panting by the time we arrived at the mouth of the place.

It had the typical ancient look about it but when I looked around, I was aghast. There were so many writings along the rocky wall. Now don’t get excited coz they’re nothing to do with the ancient value of the place but the stupid works by the idiotic tourists (no doubt locals). What a waste! It was so frustrating to see how much they have wretched this place. Having boiled our blood in the morning wasn’t going to help our cause so I tried to keep my cool and see around for some interesting captures. Covered in a hall like complex lies a giant Buddha Statue. It was so huge and looking very serene and all my worries and uneasiness vanished into thin air. To make it better, there was this small monk clearing the dead flowers on the stand in front and I took a nice pic of him standing in front of Lord Buddha.

I have to do a confession before writing this trip report. This trip was arranged by Sri with Some other lakdasun members on 23rd Saturday using Sri’s old Strategy, Face book conversations. I had notified my absence In advance as I had to report duty on Saturday. But I was free on 22nd Friday. Due to various reasons most of the other members also confirmed their absence expect the little boy Tony. So that trip was postponed.