The bad thing about trying to be like a local when you are travelling is the higher chance of facing something dangerous. So in almost all of my travels I have days that I suffer: In Thailand I got robbed & almost kidnapped, in Paris I got robbed again, in Kuala Lumpur i spent 2 nights at the airport and in Sri Lanka… well to learn what happened to me you have to read the story till the end :)
We were checking a magazine that we took from the tourist information. The places cannot be missed in Sri Lanka: Pollonaruwa, Sigiriya, Dambulla, Kandy. Check! Knuckles Mountains? The photos look great, why not? Going up to the mountains and swimming under the waterfalls sounded like a plan! Since we were poor tourists we ignored the tuk tuk offers and jumped into a public bus. In Sri Lanka the buses are frustrating, FULL of people, no air to breath, the oily smell of the food sold inside the bus and a loud Sri Lankan music( You cannot imagine how bad it is). In addition to these you have to do your best not to fall down because you are literally in a rally. The bus driver seems himself as the king of the world, he doesn’t care about the oncoming traffic, all the time in the action of overtaking with his constantly honking horn.
The view from the Sri Lankan bus (This is the empty version)
After such a journey for 3 hours we arrived to the little town where the mountain is located. It was already 2 o’clock, considering the fact that the sun goes down at 6 we needed to hurry up so we got into a tuk tuk and started to climb. We were thinking it would take at most half an hour to go up but that wasn’t the case. The road got steeper and steeper when we got higher, we needed to pass from muds with our old fashioned slow tuk tuk so at one point I thought this vehicle won’t be able to make it to the top.
If you wonder what tuk tuk is
On the way the view was definitely amazing, all shades of green between magnificent mountains but I couldn’t even enjoy this heaven because my stress was dominating my excitement. It was already beginning to get dark, the weather was getting cold and the fog was increasing its intensity each minute. At around 4 we could reach to the point where the natural park starts. We knew that there was no way to go back if we don’t arrange this tuk tuk driver so we offered him 1500 rupees to take us back to the town after an hour. We gave him only 500 and when he comes back we suggested to give him the rest so we made the deal to meet at 5:00 at the same place.
That’s where we got stucked
The disaster started just at the minute the tuk tuk driver left, my friend realized that he dropped his phone in the tuk tuk. We tried to convinced ourselves that the driver won’t see the phone and we can take it back when he is back. We began to follow the small path between the jungle. (I ’m not exaggerating when I say jungle) Suddenly after 15 mins walk I felt a pain in my feet when I looked at them I was almost having a heart attack, tens of leeches were sucking my blood! With my hand I tried to get rid of them and started to run back. I don’t know how but they were appearing on my feet ceaselessly. They were the most disgusting creatures, they could even infiltrate from the shoes to inside. I was so scared. You know at those moments you always think the worst case scenario: what if they are poisonous? How long will it take till the poison shows its effects? Am I gonna die soon? Fighting with these thoughts I arrived to the point we were gonna meet the driver i made my checks to make sure there are no more leeches on my feet. Clear. We had to wait 30 more mins in this place! While we were waiting, the rain started to pour, we couldn’t even go hide under the trees as the leeches were attacking all the time. I was already freezing and the rain was the thing I needed most. It had been 5:00 o’clock, no signs from the driver, let’s wait for a while. Then 5:15; still nobody appeared, should we start to scare? 5:30. We were sure he wouldn’t come back. What the f*ck are we gonna do now? We began to walk to the direction where we came, even though we knew there was nothing close by. It hasn’t been a few minutes that both the rain and the fog increased its strength incredibly. It was monsoon season in Sri Lanka, you cannot even compare the rain with the ones we saw here, probably being under a shower makes you less wet. In such a rain and fog we ran hopelessly, we had to find a place before it gets dark but how? I could hardly open my eyes in the rain, my clothes were all wet so was my bag, my passport, my notebook, my phone…but there was no time to stop. I, the person that cannot run more than half an hour normally, ran 1.5 hours without any pause as fast as I could. During this run to the unknown, I had so mixed feelings, as opposed to your expectations I was laughing like crazy I was feeling strong but desperate at the same time. Will I be able to survive? Will I be able to go back to my country? See my family again? If I can survive its gonna be an amazing story to tell, if I can survive… My brain was forcing itself with these thoughts unintentionally. Then we saw an abandoned house, we ran there to hide from the rain but it was so stupid we couldn’t be more wet. It was exactly like a horror movie I was scared, so scared. The house had no windows nothing, if we would spend the night there we would freeze. Also inside was full of insects and leeches. We had to keep running. It was already dark, we were the only humans on this fucking mountain, plus our companion animals that I didn’t even want to think of. After another half an hour we saw a light from far away, a light that awoke my hopes. I ran even faster but it didn’t take so long that we understood the first light was coming from a glasshouse. I had never felt that desperate in my life. Probably you never experienced a situation like this but in such a case with the instinct of survival you can do things that you are normally never able to do. With this extraordinary power I kept running. There was another light in front. “Please this time a house”, I said to myself. Then we saw the tuk tuk in the garden, yes it was a house!! Without hesitating we entered the doorless house/market.The owner, an old man, was eating dinner with his family. When he saw the two strangers with soaking wet clothes he got shocked at first. We tried to explain the situation, the driver, phone, rain. He seemed like he didn’t understand us so we tried the easiest way: “tuk tuk, we need a tuk tuk to go back”. He finally understood but in that rain nobody wanted to drive. We offered him high amount of money so at last he said ok and called his driver friend. “Wait 30 mins and he’ll be here” he said. With my wet clothes I was freezing like hell so I asked him if he can sell me some dry clothes. At that moment 4 people got into the house as well. They were Sri Lankans in their 20s and were in Knuckles for holiday. Their English was good so we explained them everything. They were so nice that one of them brought his luggage inside and gave me a short, I also bought a t-shirt from the owner. With my new dirty smelly but dry boy clothes I was the happiest person on earth.
A view from the house we found
While we were drinking some tea to get warm 4 more people entered. I had no idea what those people were doing there but I think that was our luck after all these troubles. The new comers were really interesting combination: a Sri Lankan living in America ( with a pure American accent), a monk, a Bob Marley ( you’ll understand why I called him like that later), and a normal guy. So we were 11 people in this small house now, 10 guys and me. After a while we started to chat, we learnt that these new comers were also going to the city that we stay. “If you don’t mind sitting four people on the back, you are welcome to come with us” they said. What a chance!! It was definitely an offer we couldn’t reject. But before leaving we needed to take a memory photo of that night, here it is: