My friend Susan Kean and her partner George went on a trip to Sri Lanka in March, touring the island country with a focus on plants and gardens. Susan has graciously shared her impressions and photos with The Intrepid Tourist. Thank you, Susan! This is the second of two parts.
Different types of tea. When the country changed its name to Sri Lanka, they kept the Ceylon name for the tea, as it was well-known worldwide.
The next part of the trip was a visit to a tea plantation and Victoria park in Nuwara Eliya, part of the town that is known as little England. They have a Turf Club with horse racing. Generally there are very few horses in Sri Lanka--all the cart pulling and farming is done by cattle.
Picking tea.
Chest of tea.
The Tea Plantation we visited was Glenloch Estate founded in 1917. All the tea is hand- picked. We saw how the tea is dried, shredded and allowed to ferment. Then it is sorted into different size leaf pieces and the leaf stems are removed.
Enjoying a cup of Orange Pekoe tea. Thank you to our guide Nuwan for the photo.
Our trip to Sri Lanka was primarily to look at plants. It is a lush verdant island. They say everything ever planted has grown! We experienced the hot humid lower regions as well as the cooler higher areas. There are dry zones and wetter rain forests and everything in between. Because there are so many flowers, there are amazing butterflies. Large 6” across to tiny ones. I didn’t have much luck photographing them!
Rice paddies.
Rice is grown in large paddies. The beige brown line along the side of the road is rice drying. The locals lay it out to dry along the side of the road and drivers respect that. One place they had rice halfway across the road and drivers had to pass on the other side!
Terraced gardens.
In the cooler areas the hillsides were terraced to grow vegetables
Lunch dishes.
Our meals were lots of variety of curry and accompaniments. Beer seems to be the favorite alcoholic drink. Though wine is not common, we found some! We also got to sample toddy, their local drink made from fishtail palm.
Girls on their way to school.
We saw girls going to school wearing white uniforms and long ties. The population is as highly educated as the US up to High School graduation. Fewer go on to University. It is much more competitive.
Beautifully laid out bedding plants in Victoria Park.
Sri Lanka is a bit smaller than Ireland with a population of about 23 million … Ireland has about 5 million! In US terms it is similar to the size of West Virginia! They export textiles, tea and spices.
Buddhist shrine.
Religion-wise it is primarily Buddhist, with about 10% each Hindu and Muslim. About 7 % are Christian. Our experience was that the people of Sri Lanka seem to be a gentle people. We never heard a raised voice! They seem to drive well. We covered a lot of miles and saw NO traffic accidents even though there is a lot of traffic.
In the orchid house at the Botanic Garden.
