Fog and Cold on Horton Plains

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Horton Plains World's End/Baker's Falls Loop to Pattipola
Kilometres: 23 Elevation gain/loss: 603m/923m

Horton Plains offers scenery unlike anywhere else in Sri Lanka, a combination of windswept grassy moors, bogs and dense forests, more like what you would expect someplace in Scotland rather than on a tropical island 6 degrees from the equator. It's stark, bleak, the colours muted and the soil blackened. The kind of place you'd expect to find a tormented Heathcliff standing atop a crag, cape flapping in the wutheringness.

Scene from the movie

Horton Plains

I'm Canadian. From the Great White North. Land of blizzards and ice storms, igloos and the world's finest ice hockey teams. I'm supposed to be genetically able to handle the cold. My national identity demands it. But not so. Doubly not so when it's foggy, dark and windy. Horton Plains can serve up a bitter chill so by mid-afternoon we were happy to get indoors, although staying in the drafty, mist-swaddled Maha Eliya bungalow was anything but cosy. Hot, heaping servings of instant packet noodles (my grandmother's secret recipe) put a little heat in our tums, but we spent the night tucked under sleeping bags and four blankets each, still in our fleeces and fuzzy woolly hats.

By morning, most of the clouds and fog had lifted, promising clear (enough) views if we could get to the cliff edge early. After 9:00 or 10:00 a.m., the clouds will usually roll in again obscuring any view down below. From the Farr Inn (no longer an inn, now the information centre) at the centre of the park, it's about a 10-11 kilometre loop to World's End, the dramatic drop off which overlooks Belihul Oya some 1000 meters below, on to Baker's Falls, and back again. Circular, it's impossible to get lost on the route, which is well sign-posted at any junction, and in fact it's forbidden to walk off route to protect the fragile ecosystem. The beauty of Horton Plains, though, is not just the spots where everyone - and I do mean everyone - whips out their cameras and takes the mandatory shots (see pics below). The beauty is in the wide open spaces, the long, undulating grasslands, and the completely "other" feel it has. One thing you'll note, thanks again to the ever-guilty British, is the presence (infestation) of invasive, exotic species which are now near impossible to eradicate.

World's End

Baker's Falls

One joy of walking is that you make almost no noise, and so the wildlife doesn't take off running as you approach. You also go at a pace which allows you to really see, to look into the trees and find the bear monkeys, or get up close to a sambar, or watch a tiny lizard burying her eggs in the ground, things you can't do from inside a comfortable, speeding metal box. In the dim light of the foggy plains, it's easy to miss the wildlife, but it abounds. Horton Plains is unique in the country, the only national park you can actually walk through, and that alone is enough to earn it top marks.

From the exit gate of the park, it's a steady six kilometres downhill to Pattipola, the highest train station in the country, a pretty little depot that takes unusual pride in its display, with cheerful florals, and a dapper little station master who, quite obviously, daily polishes the antique-but-still-working-fine tablet machines. Unchanged from when the British first built the railroads into the hill country, key-like tablets are taken from and exchanged with each passing train to ensure there are no collision. The system has been used for hundreds of years, but hey, if it ain't broke...

Here in Pattipola, my friends departed home, and I spent a not uncomfortable night having rented a room in a local family home. There are no "proper" guest houses in Pattipola, so you take what you can get and are grateful for it. I had no complaints, but by morning - another long walk ahead of me - I was gone.

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Haputale to Ohiya to Horton Plains
Kilometres: 29.5   Elevation gain/loss:  1014m/352m

A long stretch of being alone, walking alone, dining alone, dealing alone, was finally broken when my friend Priyanjan and his son decided they just couldn't pass up a good hike and joined in for the walk up to Horton Plains.

Setting out in the morning from Haputale, we walked along two quite different routes to reach Ohiya, the tiny railroad stop below Horton Plains to the south. Head from the town on the road leading up and to the west, towards the stone-block Adisham Benedictine Monastery, a landmark building once the home of British tea-planters, and you will find a small footpath trail that starts just to the immediate left of the gate entrance. It winds through the Thangamale Forest Sanctuary, through eucalyptus groves and dense jungle. Some attention is required to follow the trail, which at times becomes thin and indistinct, but then picks up easily a few meters ahead. Fast burning fires have charred some of the area, not damaging the trees badly but blackening sections of earth and clearing out the undergrowth.

After about nine kilometres, the trail then emerges just above the rail tracks at Idalgashinna station. Signs along the railroad, antiques from colonial times, still warn (in dire tones) of the unforgiving punishment that awaits anyone who walks along the track. Of course, the track is used by all local villagers as the main footpath between Idalgashinna and Ohiya, and the slow moving trains that pass offer ample warning and little danger.

The weather began to close in on us, heavy fog clouds completely obscuring the view, then suddenly blowing apart to reveal a stunning panoramic view far out to the mountains in the north. We marched on following the tracks for a further nine kilometres, along an easy gradient, passing through some 15 railway tunnels. It pays to know the train schedules, as getting caught in a long dark tunnel, with a locomotive bearing down on you, can ruin a good day. The guano on the tracks, fluttering overhead, and constant clicking noises would lead you to think these tunnels are home to colonies of bats, but surprisingly it is hundreds of swallows nesting on the ceiling that are causing all the commotion.

By late morning we had comfortably reached Ohiya, a village consisting of almost nothing, just a tiny smattering of a few buildings, apart from the railway station. The only place to stay (yes! there is a place to stay!) was the infinitely depressing, Egads-no!, only-in-case-of-desperation Suwarna Lelee Rest & Cafe. Basic? This place is a whole new level of basic! Cold, dark, dirty and gloomy, the night here did not promise to be even remotely passable. That said, and to be fair, the owner whipped out a comments book, glowing with warm reviews of the kind hospitality and food, if not the amenities.

We decided the comfort of a house with washed sheets, hot water, and the luxury of eating off of clean plates was too good to pass up, so hopped the train back down the hill, returning to spend the night at Priyanjan's family home. At 4:00 a.m., like a moose creeping on tip-toe into the room, our friend Neranjana arrived, and the party was complete for the next day's trek onwards from Ohiya up to Horton Plains.

Catching the early morning train back to Ohiya, we continued upwards along the 11 kilometres to the center of the national park. The well-paved road, although steep in places, is a straightforward route and you'd have to make a serious effort to lose your way. As the road climbs, the trees of the forest around become shorter and denser, the temperatures dramatically drop and the wind picks up fiercely. Suddenly out came the fleeces, jackets, hats, gloves and umbrellas, as one by one we all succumbed to the cold. 

(continued...)