Into the Highlands

Kitulgala

Rainforest gorge, Grade 4 rapids and a David Lean filming location

  • Best time to visitMay to November for the highest water. Year-round operation.
  • Best forActive travellers, adventurous groups, rafting and nature lovers
White Water Rafting

The Kelani Ganga at Kitulgala runs Grade 3 to 4 rapids through a gorge where the rainforest comes down to the water on both sides. The Bridge on the River Kwai was filmed here in 1957 and the original bridge supports are still visible in the river. About 12 kilometres of water, certified operators and safety kayakers throughout. Finished by noon, with the afternoon free.

Horton Plains

The roof of Sri Lanka - a plateau that simply ends at World’s End

At 2,100 metres, Horton Plains is the highest and flattest landscape in Sri Lanka. The 9-kilometre circular trail passes through montane cloud forest to World’s End, a sheer escarpment where the plateau simply stops and the plains 900 metres below open out on a clear morning. Baker’s Falls on the return route. The dawn departure is non-negotiable.

Nuwara Eliya

The colonial hill station at 1,868 metres - still faintly Victorian

Nuwara Eliya was built by the British to feel like home, and the result is genuinely strange and wonderful - a Victorian post office, a racecourse, a hill club with a dress code and tea estates stretching across every visible hillside. The cold air, the colonial buildings and the estate landscape combine into something unlike anywhere else in South Asia.

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