Camping at Horton Plains and hike to Thotupola

Horton Plains is one of my favorite places in Srilanka. So I spoke with some of my friends to go on a trip there and Pasindu, who has prior experience in camping, was the first to jump in and suggest the idea of camping at HP. I put in that we walk the whole journey from Pattipola to HP and back. We gathered all information from “Lakdasun” and www.travelogueslanka.com

We booked the Friday Badulla night mail train and reserved Camp Site 1 and did all the other arrangements.
We were on time for the train and had a good time in the train. We were supposed to sleep so that we would be fit enough for the day ahead, but no one could sleep with all the excitement.

From left: Thawoos, Myself and Pasindu.

By the time we passed Nanuoya, it started to rain. We reached Pattipola at around 4.30 am on Saturday. Having all dressed and prepared for the long trek, we took a group picture and started at about 5.40 am.

From left: Pancha, Sukumal, Pasindu, Dimuthu, Thawoos & Myself

It was drizzling when we started. It was so misty we could hardly see the road ahead of us. It is about 5km to the Pattipola gate entrance if I’m not mistaken.

Carrying the two tents was a hassle.

We walked for about an hour and took a small break to have some Cream Cracker biscuits with Glucose. I personally don’t like Creak Cracker biscuits, but it was awesome on that day due to the tiredness

Our first break. Cream Cracker biscuits with Glucose.

We started to walk again up to Pattipola gate entrance and on the way saw a few Jungle Fowls and as it was raining, I hardly managed to get some pics.

A Jungle Fowl

We reached the gate entrance at about 8.00 am and by that time, it was raining cats and dogs. We had a small chat with the officials there and inquired about Leopards etc. They also told that in this weather, we won’t be able pitch our tents. The wind was so strong that we were being lifted while we walked. We didn’t lose hope though we were disappointed about the weather. We proceeded the next 5-6 km trek to Farr Inn. Once in a while the rain would stop for a few minutes and would start again.

Another group picture. Thank God I carried my tripod with me

We took a small break near Maha Eliya Bungalow to admire a Sambar Deer. He came towards us, maybe people have fed him and he is used to it.

The Sambar Deer who came to us in search of food

By the time we reached Farr Inn, it was 10.30 am. We headed straight to the canteen to fill our tummies. A rotti with “Katta Sambol” at the canteen was Rs 50/=. We had that and a tea and rested for a while. It was about 11.30 am when Dimuthu got a call and he had to go back to Colombo, leaving the five of us. It was only about a kilometer from Farr Inn to Camp Site 1 as per the officials. We got to our camp site at about 1.00 pm after spending a lot of time at Farr Inn.

When we arrived, we did some cleaning. There was evidence of camp fires set on the grass. There were bottles and polythene on the ground. We collected all those and put in a separate garbage bag to take with us outside, to Farr Inn and throw it. It was so unpleasant to see people harming the nature.

It was so freezing and raining. We had no idea on how we could start pitching our tents in that rain. Luckily, we had a rain fly which served the purpose. First we set the rain fly, kept all our backpacks beneath it and started to put up both the tents.

We could utilize only a small space for the tents because we had only one rain fly

By the time we were all set, it was around 3.00 pm. I have to say that, the toilet was very well maintained. Maybe because it is not used frequently, or maybe the officials clean it, I am not sure. But it was odorless and very clean. We made ourselves some “Samahan” and had it inside the tent

They were the occupants of one tent. Sukumal, Pancha and Pasindu

We were the occupants of the other tent. Thawoos and Myself

The rain fly was worth a million bucks because the wind was so strong and we had to tie the rain fly very low to the ground to keep the tents from flying away.

Our plan was to do the circular trail on that day, but due to the weather and time constraints, we couldn’t do it. Pasindu and sukumal went off to the Canteen to bring us some food to survive in the night. They came back with the same “Rotti” and “Katta Sambol”. We thought of keeping that for the next day and we made some rice. Our dinner was at about 6.30 pm which was rice with chili paste.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of that. We were so tired and cold and we went to sleep at 7.30 pm itself. But we didn’t fall asleep until about 11 pm. Me and Pancha were the ones who slept the least. It was a sleepless night for me. We still laugh at office reminding ourselves of that night. Pasindu would call me from the other tent purposely to see whether I am awake and they would laugh when I reply knowing that I am not asleep. He used to call my sirname:

Pasindu: Athaaaasssss???

Myself: Kiyapaaaang

I wish someone had invented a machine that could record your feelings so that you could replay it whenever needed. because that night was a lifetime unforgettable experience. I was wearing three thick t-shirts and a sweater and covering myself with a sheet and also a blanket on top of it. But still I was shivering. All of us had the same experience. I could feel something crawling up beneath the tent under my body. Maybe a snake or a huge worm, I don’t know. Again, after a few hours when I repositioned my foot, it stuck something fleshy, the size of a big frog. I couldn’t do anything and I don’t know what all those animals were because it was pitching dark because we could not take a lantern with us. What made it worse was, my tent was leaking. We heard a leopard roar in the opposite mountain at about 4.00 am. However after 5.00 am, I fell asleep. It was about 8.30 am on Sunday when we woke. Our breakfast was Gram with chopped onion & chili paste which we prepared in the morning.

An early morning visitor. I saw some of them in the stream as well.

Me and Pasindu wanted to climb the opposite mountain and take some pictures. We saw a huge rabbit hopping past us in the mountain. There was rabbit poo every inch in that mountain, though we managed to see only one. After some relaxing and photography, we started to pack and move out from the camp site to Farr Inn at about 1.30 pm.

Our camp site from the opposite mountain.

Cleaned everything leaving only footprints

Saying goodbye to the camp site and on the way back to Farr Inn

When we reached Farr Inn, we had a plain tea and gave the canteen person our extra food which we couldn’t consume (green gram and some rice) as a gratitude and in return he didn’t charge us for our beverage.

From Farr Inn, our next destination was Thotupola Kanda. We started at about 2.30 pm and reached the entrance of Thotupola Kanda at about 4.00 pm and had our Rotti and started the hike at 4.30 pm.

The Thotupola Kanda trail

We reached the summit at about 5.30 pm with extreme wind conditions and heavy rain. Nothing was visible from the summit.

At Thotupola Kanda summit

On the way back, we saw a lot of fresh leopard poo which was not there when we climbed. So during that time period, there had been many leopards crossing the trail.

We climed down at about 6.15 pm and was at Pattipola gate entrance at 6.40 pm. The train to Colombo was scheduled to arrive at 9.15 pm at Pattipola station. So we had to hurry.

From Pattipola gate entrance, it was dark and raining, strong wind and falling branches all over the road. We had Pasindu’s head torch and Sukumal’s torch as well. About 1 km before the Pattipola station maybe any of you can remember a small “Ambalama”. Around that area, when Pasindu was directing the torch to the side of the road, me and Pasindu spotted a leopard about 5 meters ahead of us. We could only see his eyes because the torch lit his eyes and we quickly pointed the light away from him. Passing him after about 4-5 meters, we instructed sukumal and Pancha to point the torch backwards and check whether our spotted friend was following us. Luckily he had disappeared. Probably he was hunting rabbits because we saw two rabbits running ahead of us at the same time we saw the cat.

We reached Pattipola station at 7.50 pm. The descend took us only 1 hour because we had to reach Pattipola as fast as we could to make sure that we don’t miss the train.

The train arrived at Pattipola station at 11.00 pm which was about 1 hour and 45 mints late. I fell asleep as soon as I got in and woke up at about 4.30 am on Monday. To my surprise, the train was not moving. When we inquired, the train had derailed at 12.30 am. By the time the officials came to set the train back on track, it was 10.00 am. As you can see in the picture below, it had jumped in from the “check rail” whereas it should be in between the “check rail”.

There were about 3 carriages and one engine in this state

After everything was set, the train started the journey again at about 10.30 am and stopped in Galboda because a rock had fallen on the railroad a few km’s ahead. Somehow, the train which was supposed to be at Fort railway station at 6.00 am on Monday arrived at Fort at 8.00 pm on Monday.

Totally we could cover only around 30 Km of walking in this trip whereas we planned for 44 Km including Kirigalpoththa, which we couldn’t with the weather conditions. So until the next hike, be safe and have a nice day everyone and thank you for reading my trip report.