Thursday 10th April

Well the ports are ticking away alarmingly quickly. Today was Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka, it’s a large port and we were deep inside it amongst a plethora of general cargo ships being loaded and unloaded by dockside cranes and ships own derricks. It was a scene that must have been a familiar site in many UK ports before containerisation, seeing it once again was an interesting journey back in time. We were a couple of miles from the main dockyard gates and there were buses already lined up for the various trips programmed for the day, many of which were early starts. Down on the quay amongst the various officials waiting to board was a group of Sinhalese dancers and drummers gathering to welcome passengers as they stepped ashore. As we stepped ashore they were twisting and twirling in a frenetic style reminiscent of whirling dervishes, but we didn’t have time to stop and watch as our trip to a tea plantation was a two and a half hour journey into the hills. The trip through Colombo was a fascinating experience of everything you have heard about Asian cities. We were straight into a maelstrom of tuk-tuks, bikes, motorbikes, taxis, buses and lorries, all disobeying any rule that the signs were seeking to impose (each sign is written in three languages, Sinhalese, Tamil and English). At one stage an ambulance came down our side of the dual carriageway against the flow of traffic, causing all sorts of chaos, we could only hope that if there was a patient on board, they were not aware of the danger they were in. As we got into the centre we were told that this was a “quiet” day as the schools were on holiday. At a particularly busy intersection the traffic lights had been turned off and police on horseback were directing traffic reinforced by loud whistles, because the junctions got so grid logged that the lights ended up being totally ignored.

After a time traffic finally got lighter and we eventually hit a brand new motorway where things got better as few people seemed to want to pay the toll to use it. Coming off the motorway we started to climb into the foothills through small towns and villages until we reached the Kitagawa Plantations and the Rayigam Tea Factory. The landscape here was typical terraced tea plantation you see on the sides of some tea packets and I remembered from school projects. A brilliant fresh lush green. At the top of the hill we pulled up behind a planter’s bungalow and walking round to the front we saw tables and chairs set out for tea, with a fantastic view down the valley, we could be back 85 years when the bungalow was first built. They served us a slice of sponge cake and a cup of tea from a teapot (no tea bags here) and as tea jenny I can honestly say it was the best cup of tea I’d had for many a year. No small wonder as we found out it was their top of the range tea (BOPF Broken Orange Piko Feinings). I noticed a small stand to one side with some foil bags on so I wandered over and there were a couple of signs with prices on but no one near. We eventually found someone who we could ask if this was the tea we had been drinking. It was and I bought a Kilogram for $10 US, bargain! After tea we were driven down to the tea factory and on the way we watched the pickers plucking the top few leaves and buds and putting them in the sacks tied round the front of their foreheads and hanging behind them. We were shown round the factory which was remarkably small for the quantity it produced and at the end had a go at tasting. It was over too soon and we were on our way back, passing rubber plantations on the same estate. The rubber was dripping into the collector cups at quite a rate, but it was ‘the tea wot won it’.

We ended the day watching our departure as we slowly reversed out of our quay in this still busy dockyard before going down to dinner. However the day didn’t end quite as well as it started because during dinner Carol didn’t feel too well and had to leave the table early.