We promised ourselves this momentous train ride from Colombo to Nuwera Eliya. A must-see for tourists and locals alike as they say. Six tickets, one for each of us and a friend, four days before we bid our farewell, took us to an 8-hour slow but pleasant ride to hill country of Nuwera Eliya.

A momentous 8 hour trip of our lives!

Such madness! You might say. Four days to your flight and you are still sight seeing, after four long years of you stay? 

Why do we really want to take this journey amidst the chaos of our move? We hardly had sleep these days and there are suitcases to fill up, yet I will tell you why.

We learned to love this country, its turmoil and tranquility, to gloriously bask in its simplicity and elaborate beauty, to love its tea estates, national parks, bird sanctuaries, waterfalls, hills, rivers and wewas. We love its sun, sand and salty air. We are fascinated with their people, both Tamil and Sinhalese, each unique identity and ethnicity, of how graceful their loops of writing are and how melodious the sound of their words, their cricket matches amidst bomb threats, for their love of Bollywood which infected and humoured us. We love their sarees, sarongs and shalwars, their hoppers: string, egg, plain; their tea: loose leaf or in bags, their cinnamon sticks, coriander and curry leaf, all spices in abundance. We will miss Odel, Thiangra, Cotton Collection, Sen Sal, Blue Water, Mango Tree, Nihon Bashi, 888 or Curry Bowl, or just riding around in a trishaw. We will never get over the freakiness of finding out how elephant dung paper came to be and how monitor lizards can excite street traffic for no driver would think of of a roadkill. We will miss the haunting call of kingfishers, perky noisy squawks of parakeets and soulful songs of the Ko-el. Nor the morning squirrels skittering their way to my kitchen window for breakfast scraps. We will miss our Cinnamon Garden Baptist Church family, cell group, youth and all. For here we found friends (the Raneys, the Hallocks, Plan and more) who are more a family than just friends. aaaah, Ceylon... we hope to touch your shores again.

Just maybe, a train ride closes a chapter of our lives... but in our hearts, we know we will never get enough or will ever get enough of this tiny island, a tear pearl tucked away under the threatening tsunamis of the Indian Ocean, yet it will with hope arise someday to shine!

Ride with us and see what this trip has in store for you... I hope it will amaze you as much as it did us.

Of 200+ photos we have taken, here are some 120 of  'em...

The Lowlands

Can't miss a dogoba.. even among paddy and bananas..

"Doesn't it get any better than bananas and coconuts?" 

Kingfisher on pole

Sarong on track

To market. to market.. to buy a big Coke?

We are approaching the hills!

Continued..