On day 3 we set off for a trip round a tea estate and then on to 
Nureya Ella . We wandered through the busy town and colourful vegtable market, trying to recognize the produce, including the betel nut wrapped in a leaf with lime, like chalk, that turns red when mixed with saliva and stains the pavements when spat out. We finally recognized something from our visit 35 yrs ago -the Hill House club, now a hotel. The doorman was very welcoming and gave us a brief guided tour and invited us to become a day member to be able to buy a beer.
After 2 more hours of twisty roads, lined with tea bushes, we arrived at Ella. The small town was surprisingly full of Europeans, young backpackers and family groups with young children. Apparently the town , now with over 100 homestays and guesthouses has grown to accomodate the tourists who come straight from Colombo airport on the overnight train to chill out in the hills before they move on to explore Sri Lanka. Not that there was much to do excepct walk up little Adam's peak
Finding our 9 arches lodge was difficult, because it had copied the name from another hotel that confused our driver and was down a very narow lane, too narrow for his car, which resulted in his scraping the door on a projecting water pipe . He was not at all pleased. We were a bit shocked by the simplicity of the room after our grand first hotel, but its all part of the adventure. The shared balcony had an amazing view of the train, when it came emerging from a tunnel and crawling, literally, round the mountain side. We wrapped up warm because of a cool breeze that whipped up the valley and had a simple curry for supper at the homestsy.
Peter refused to eat rice and daal again for breakfast, just drank tea, but our host family was friendly enough. We then set off down the steep path to reach the railtrack below, and walked along it to the station to meet our driver, ignoring like everyone else the 'walking on the railtack is forbidden' sign. 
Walking in 30+C heat is very tiring and Peter struggled a bit to get to the top of little Adams peak to see the view. It was much easier coming down but maybe a cold drink of water was not the best cooling medicine and he nearly passed out. So an afternoon sleep at our cool mountain look out was welcome . We walked down into town later for a pizza , prwan cocktail,washed down with beer, a change from rice and curry.
Next morning at 7.00 we were on the road waiting for Christopher who found a flash western breakfsdt - fruit,eggs and toast at a very up market Jetwing hotel in the middle of nowhere on our way to the National Park to see Elephants - a great outing. Then we arrived at the coast for a late afternoon swim in our next luxury hotel, looking out onto crashing waves and with wonderful food.