We got back to rail track before about 500m to Idalgashinna Station and walked towards the station along the track. We had out snacks at the Station and started the restof the journey at about 4.00pm from there. (Advisable to walk in an average speed from haputale to idalgashinna part as you will miss the beauty from idalgashinna to ohiya if it gets darker. Some How We Managed our walking pace for the next part)

Year and Month  July 2016 Number of Days  Half a day Crew  06 – Prakash, Shashika, Ranga, Kasun, Aruna & My self Accommodation  N/A Transport  Train Activities  Mountain hike & Photography Weather  Excellent Route  Colombo -> Idalgashinna -> Idalgashinna mountain Tips, Notes and Special remark  Start the journey as early as possible Ask direction from […]

In childhood I heard that song “Haputal Api Yanawa”. Ever since I want to go to Haputale. I should admit Haputale is very scenic place although people do not visit Haputale as much as some other over rated places. It is a small town with plenty of places to accommodate. You can reach Haputale by bus or train if you use public transport.

බි‍්‍රතාන්‍ය පාලන සමයේ ලංකාවේ විවිධාකාර සංවර්ධන ක‍්‍රියාවලි සිදුවිය. ඒ සියල්ලම ඔවුන්ගේ පහසුව වෙනුවෙන් සිදුවූ ඒවාය. ඒ අතර අදටත් අප භාවිත කරන විශ්මයජනක කර්තව්‍යය වනුයේ උඩරට දුම්රිය මාර්ගයයි. කිලෝමීටර 292 ක් දිග කොළඹ-බදුල්ල දුම්රිය මාර්ගයේ පිහිටි බිංගෙවල් ගණන 43 කි. අද අපේ ක‍්‍රියාදාමය නම් කි.මී. 9 ක් දුරැති ඔහිය-ඉදල්ගස්හින්න දුම්රිය මගේ චාරිකාවක් යමින් බිංගෙවල් 14 ක් හරහා යාම සහ දෙමෝදර ආරුක්කු නවයේ ඓතිහාසික පාලම යටට ගමන් කිරීමයි.

So, we start our journey without having our breakfast. First up all we should walk from the top of the tea estate behind the railway station. It is about 250m from ths retail shop. Then we have to downward from the area to the forest. The forest (Hela) is fulfill with trees and rocks. We have to go down by catching the branches. Sometimes you might get fallen due to the ground instability.

We got into 14th Saturday night mail from Colombo and reached Idalgashinna station at about 4.30am with chilling cold. After inquiring about climbing pathway we headed to the mountain around 6.30am. It was a brightened day and surrounding view was beautiful. First we climbed up through the tea estate and reached the end of the tea patch where Pinus trees start. There was no foot pathway within the Pinus forest. After about fifteen minutes we reached the second highest point where it provides good view towards Koslanda, Beragala, Haldummulla and Belihuloya.

I just checked out the time table of trains so that it’d give us a sense of times so that we could take precautions. These new Chinese trains are very quiet compared to the grumbling old German ladies. However I don’t think when it comes to performance, technology and endurance, the Chinese can come anywhere near. I’ve seen how they operate in my Exclusive Journey on the S12 some time ago. Hasi took over the meals with the help of his wife. Even though she wanted to join us, a sudden illness confined her to the house. We were very excited, especially Hasi as this was going to be his first ever rail hike. I could imagine how he felt coz it was the same when I was getting ready for my first rail hike.

Lahiru joined me at Fort railway station around 7.15 p.m. on Friday evening and waited till Badulla bound night mail train arrives to the flat foam. Soon after the train came around 7.30 p.m. we got in and were able to grab 2 seats. Being at the railway station in advance allowed us not to experience the difficulty of going standing specially in the night for long time. The train left Colombo at 8.15 p.m. and reached Haputale around 6.00 in the morning. After having a rest for a few minutes, we headed towards Ohiya.

We departed from Colombo early morning and reached Beragala around 9am. When we got down at Beragala there was a bus waiting for Wellawaya. Latter part of A4 road from Beragala to Wellawaya was not in good condition. From Koslanda we got a trishaw to first visit at Meeriyabadda (මීරියබැද්ද) Land slide site and then Diyaluma waterfall.

It was one of those random weekends and I didn’t have any scheduled places to visit so I headed towards Badarawela. It was almost 1pm when I got down at Halpe and my first place of interest was Gangarama temple. Though the Uva tourist board had put up a notice board, this temple didn’t have any historical importance. Next target was Yahalamaditta temple.

It was a rainy Friday when I went to Gampola from Colombo to spend the weekend at my aunt’s place. I took the 5.50 am train from Colombo and reached Gampola at about 10.30 am. My mother was at my aunt’s place and as we were having a small chat, she wanted me to go to Haputale and deliver some documents to a relative. I was instantly willing to go because I have not been to Haputale for years. As soon as I was dreaming about going by train to Haputale, I remembered Ashan ayya’s trip report on his hike from Badulla to Ambewala 🙂 YES, I wanted to do at least a small bit of it.

Some friends came to our home to spend a holiday with us. As they hadn’t gone in a local train we decided to do a short train trip. The easiest trip to do was to take the morning train to Pattipola and to catch a train back home.