Tracing the path from Ambewela to Dayagama

“This was a journey to capture beautiful landscapes with green and blue combination.”

Ambewela is called little New Zealand of Sri Lanka. The climatic conditions of Ambewela make it an ideal location for dairy farming in Sri Lanka. It has highest (in attitude) and largest grasslands in Sri Lanka.
Chamara has traced a pathway from Ambewela (අඹේවෙල) to Dayagama (ඩයගම) via new Zealand farm and this is an old estate road now becomes a foot pathway. We have decided to do this trail which starts from Ambewela station as a tarred road and ends at East Dayagama as a foot pathway with 6km distance. (All together 10km till we get the bus at East Dayagama).

Chamara, Nuwan and Myself started the journey from Kandy to get into the night mail. Prakash and Thilina were traveling from Pettah and we reached Ambewela by 3.30am. It was chilling cold when we got down at Ambewela and Prabath joined with us in next hour. (He missed the train and all the way came from Colombo by bus). We have waited at Ambewela station for breakfast and food stalls were opened bit late as it was the poya day.

Good morning Ambewela

Sun rise at Ambewela station

Posing with chilling cold

Is it a branch of KMP Wadiya knuckles??

Sun rise at Ambewela

Fresh after last night rain

Ambewela Railway station

Fresh after last night rain

Entering to the road to New Zealand farm

We walked down the road towards entrance of New Zealand farm from Ambewela and passed Ambewela reservoir and grassy lands of the farm. Piduruthalagala range at the back ground of Ambewela wind farm¸ Hakgala Mountain, Kikiliyamana, Single tree Hill, Great Western Mountain and Conical Hills were seen in on side. Hortain plains with it’s hills were seen in other side of the road. Grassy lands of the farm were on either side of the road made beautiful captures.
New Zealand farm opened at 9am and there were fewer crowds might be due to early morning. We have visited different sections of the farm and then started the second part of the journey along wild trail.

We bought some carrots

Ambewela Reservoir

Team at Ambewela Reservoir

Vegetable farms at Ambewela

Passing grass lands of New Zealand farm

Passing grass lands of New Zealand farm

Passing grass lands of New Zealand farm

Perfect weather

Perfect weather

Piduruthalagala range with Ambewela wind farm

Conical Hills (2166m)-Left and Great Western Mountain (2216m)-Right

Towards Hortain Plains

Cows at New Zealand farm

Enjoying blue and green combination.

Towards Nuwara Eliya-Piduruthalagala and Conical Hills

The team

Scenic road towards New Zealand farm

Found on the side of the road

Close to the entrance of New Zealand farm

Close to the entrance of New Zealand farm. The mountain range with a forest reserve is situated behind the farm.

New Zealand Farm
This is the only dairy farm at Ambewela area opened for public visit. It opens at 8am daily and charge Rs 100 per adult and Rs 20 per school student. At farm you can visit milking area of cows, rabbit cages etc. You can buy milk products as well.

Frisian cows at New Zealand farm.

Towards Hortain Plains

At New Zealand farm

At New Zealand farm

දැති නගුල

Milking area and grassy lands of New Zealand farm

Milking area. There are scheduled times for milking

Frisian cows at New Zealand farm.

Milking area of New Zealand farm.

Milking area and worker’s houses of the farm.

Waiting for milking.

At New Zealand farm. The road we followed is seen behind cows.

The foot pathway started behind the farm. Soon it entered to the forest patch. (This is the continuation of Hortain plains). Hortain plains with Agra Bopath/Kudahagala (2320m) and Kirigalpoththa (2395m) were seen clearly. We have reached the maximum height of the trail and started to descend. Within one or two kilometers we have reached the tea patch.

View towards grassy lands of the farm from the road to Dayagama.

Mount Hakgala -2170m (right hand side) with Piduruthalagala range.

Piduruthalagala peak (2524m) with it’s towers.

Grassy lands of New Zealand farm

Namunukula (2036m) is seen

What a view

Whole team: Chamara (left), me, Thilina, Prakash, Nuwan and Prabath (right)

Clicked for a jump

Giants of Hortain Plains: Agra Bopath (2320m) and Kirigalpoththa (2395m)new

Chamra is dreaming of next target: Agra Bopath

Kirigalpoththa-2nd highest peak of Sri Lanka.

Agra Bopath-4th highest peak of Sri Lanka

Now have to descend along forest patch

Still estate road is seen at some places

Entering to the tea estate and we followed short cuts to descend rather than main road.

Distance view

East Dayagama line houses

Dell Mountain

From the tea estate we could notice few cascades and one was identified as Agra Bopath Falls-Upper which is situated closer to Dayagama-Hortain Plains trail. We wanted to reach the lower cascade and followed short cuts through tea bushes. Though we reached there we couldn’t come to the base of the fall as a rain started to falls heavily. It stopped our journey for one and half hour. At the end we could watch a seasonal cascade apart from the waterfall we target. All these waterfalls are made by Agra Oya and it’s tributaries.

Agra Oya cascade-Lower after rain

Seasonal cascade flowing to Agra Oya. There is a power house infront of this waterfall. Agra Oya flows to main feeding tributary of Mahaweli River, Kotmale Oya.

Closer view of seasonal waterfall .

Then we walked to East Dayagama line house to get the bus to Dayagama. From Dayagama it is effective to travel to Hatton to get buses rather than going to Nuwara Eliya via Thalawakale. It ended one day trekking to Ambewela to Dayagama.

Tracing the path: Black star at Ambewela and Red star at end point at East Dayagama. Click image to enlarge

Thanks for reading