| On a weekend at the beach resort of Mount Lavinia, a Swedish woman, an English schoolboy and I crowded into the back of Baja (putt-putt or scooter cab) and put-putted slowly uphill past lumbering elephants to the ancient capital of Kandy where we explored the Temple of the Tooth. As the sun set, we continued along a highland road to the tea plantation of Dalhousie where a three-thousand-foot staircase invites throngs of pilgrims to climb to the temple-crowned top of Adams Peak. The Swedish woman begged off of the climb, preferring to remain behind with our accommodating baja driver while the English lad and I ascended the stairs well-illuminated by street lights. Just before dawn we reached the temple on the summit where along with a host of several nationalities we admired a spectacular sunrise. The jolting descent down some thirty three hundred steps nearly ruined my knees.
Later the same day (Sunday), the three of us squeezed back into the two-person baja and almost coasted downhill to Colombo via a different route, which allowed us to enjoy lunch at a hotel that overlooks the jungle-clad river where David Lean's "Bridge on the River Kwai" was filmed. We looked for but failed to see any ghosts of William Holden or Alec Guinness. |
