DESTINATIONS INDIAN OCEAN | SRI LANKA
DON’T MISS
E Nuwara Eliya: This tea country town is reminiscent of the Scottish highlands – so play up the connection with a round on its famous golf course.
E Anuradhapura: This ancient city is the birthplace of Buddhism in Sri Lanka.
E Temple of the Tooth: This Kandy complex is said to hold a fragment of Buddha’s remains.
SECURITY
E Reassure clients that the Sri Lankan government has stepped up security across key tourist sites following the Easter Sunday attacks. Security at the airport has been enhanced, with a vehicle scan and passport check on approach, and a bag scan before entering.
E Visitors can expect rigorous checks at temples and religious sites too, and police checkpoints on the roads, but there’s no reason for this to have any impact on their holiday in Sri Lanka.
BOOK IT
Travel Gallery offers a 14-night holiday with SriLankan Airways flights, a car and driver-guide, daily activities including wildlife viewing, guided sightseeing, a scenic train journey, cooking class and tea estate visit, from £2,495. Accommodation is at Ulagalla, Jetwing Vil Uyana, Uga Bay Pasikudah, Jetwing St Andrews and Rosyth Estate House. Upgrade to business- class flights for £1,600.
travel-gallery.co.uk
56 8 AUGUST 2019
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Rock Villa, Rosyth Estate House; Katie McGonagle (left) with Farzana Dobbs, managing director of Travel Gallery, at Sigiriya; leopard
lazing on the branch of a tree – so languid he barely seemed to move at all – but perhaps more surprising was the array of birdlife and other animals we spotted along the way. From stork-billed kingfishers to an elegant purple heron dipping its long neck in and out of a water hole, the raucous cry of peacocks to the constant hum of crickets, a gaudy green bee-eater resting on a tree stump to a crested hawk eagle holding court from a branch overhanging the road, a safari is about so much more than just ticking off the big draws. That was also true of the little-known loris, a tiny nocturnal primate native to Sri Lanka. We met Chaminda Jayasekara, resident environmentalist at Jetwing Vil Uyana, just as dusk fell and, armed with red-tinted head torches, we set off on a gentle walk through the forested estate. Amid the creaking of bamboo and the wind whistling through the trees, he stopped and pointed to two tiny shapes high up in the branches – barely visible in the dark but for the glint of red light reflected in their eyes – which turned out to be a pair of infants just old enough to be left to fend for themselves. Another unexpected sighting.
FOOD FANS You can be all but guaranteed to eat well in Sri Lanka, where authentic dining ranges from crowd-pleasing hoppers – an egg-filled rice pancake popular at
The cooking lesson at Rosyth
Estate House is a great way to introduce clients to the myriad flavours that define Sri Lankan food
breakfast – to a delicious array of vegetable, fish and chicken curries that can be as spicy as you like. The cooking lesson at Rosyth Estate House, a colonial
house-turned-boutique hotel set on a tea and rubber estate near Kegalle, is a great way to introduce clients to the myriad flavours that define Sri Lankan food – and even better if they pair it with a walk around the estate to see the origin of each ingredient. Led by the trusty estate manager, we came across cashews and coconuts growing wild, nibbled at peppercorns and cloves plucked fresh from the tree, and sniffed scented curry leaves and aromatic lemongrass. Then we completed our education with a visit to the nearby Rosyth tea factory to see the long, hot process of plucking and drying the leaves that put Ceylon tea on the map. The factory felt like a throwback to Sri Lanka’s past,
and after a few days here, surrounded by the tranquil hills of this 62-acre estate, the country’s current troubles seemed to fade away. Here, as in the rest of Sri Lanka, life carries on as normal – and it’s as enchanting as ever.
TW
travelweekly.co.uk
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