Original subtitles

Join us on an epic journey

that's an intrepid train lovers' trip of a lifetime.

We'll take you high into the hills...

Every 45 feet travelled, there is one foot elevation.

..on one of the world's best preserved Victorian era railways.

We'll learn what goes into a perfect cuppa...

The young tender leaves have all the good stuff in it.

..and get up close and personal with the local wildlife.

It's a great pleasure to work with the elephants.

LOUD TRUMPETING

We'll meet the people that live and work along the railway line...

..and, before our journey's climax,

one of the great sights of railway engineering -

Nine Arch Bridge.

This is an amazing bridge and wonderful.

This is no ordinary railway journey.

This is one of the most scenic railway journeys in the world.

Sri Lanka.

Our journey begins in Sri Lanka's bustling capital, Colombo...

..at the city's main railway hub, Fort Station.

200,000 passengers pass through here every day.

We'll be travelling to the mountainous heart of Sri Lanka

on the famous Main Line.

We'll start in Colombo

and travel inland to the country's second city, Kandy.

We'll then climb up through the Hill Country

and the endless tea fields around Hatton

and past the quintessentially English city of Nuwara Eliya

to the line's summit in Pattipola.

From there it's a gradual descent to the beautiful resort

of Ella, our final station,

and the gateway to the incredible Nine Arch Bridge.

We've a long journey ahead of us so we're starting early.

It's not yet six in the morning, but local historian Nuwan

is full of beans.

We are going to have the most beautiful railway journey

from Colombo to Ella.

TRAIN HORN BLOWS

This travels through the mountains

and cascading waterfalls and beautiful bridges.

It's one of the most scenic railway journeys in the world.

We leave bang on time at five minutes to six.

As dawn breaks our Chinese-built S12 diesel electric train

pulls out of Colombo and into the suburbs.

Even this early our carriage is packed with commuters,

holidaymakers and day-trippers.

Space is at a premium.

Getting out of this hustle and bustle of Colombo is first class.

Every railway recounts a piece of a country's history.

Sri Lanka is no exception.

From 1815 to 1948 the country was part of the British Empire.

The railway is an indelible reminder of its period under colonial rule.

The railway started in 1863.

It was built by the British with the idea of transporting

freight from the mountains to the ports.

From Colombo to Kandy, it took four years to build it.

The first leg of our journey

is the 75-mile stretch from Colombo to Kandy.

Once we're out of the capital, lush tropical trees

and paddy fields line the track.

The landscape is fertile and flat...

..for a while.

This scenery is quite nice, but compared with what

you're going to see next, this is basically nothing.

An hour-and-a-half from Colombo everything changes.

Now we are climbing.

We are no more on a flat road.

We are in a straight climb

at a gradient of one to 45.

Every 45 feet travelled, there is one foot elevation.

We've reached the Alagalla mountains,

our gateway to central Sri Lanka.

The hour-long climb to Kandy will take us

to an altitude more than 1,500 feet.

170 years ago it took a fortnight to get there from Colombo.

Today it'll take us less than three hours.

The railway revolutionised travel in Sri Lanka.

But building it over such inhospitable mountainous terrain

was a mammoth undertaking.

150 years ago with no power tools,

so basically using hand tools and basic explosive materials

like gunpowder was used to blast tunnels.

It was very challenging.

It cost a lot of human life.

Hundreds of people died in this construction.

While admiring the beauty of this climb, you should remember

the people who sacrificed their life to make this possible.

At the top of the climb Sri Lanka's second city.

Now we are in Kandy.

This is the first major stop in our journey.

Kandy is the cultural and spiritual heart of Sri Lanka.

Nestled between mountain ranges 60 miles inland from Colombo...

..the city is dotted with places of worship.

Including one of the most sacred sites in the Buddhist faith.

Sri Dalada Maligawa,

The Temple Of The Sacred Tooth Relic.

Legend has it that one of the Buddha's teeth

salvaged from his cremation, a left canine,

was brought to Kandy in the 4th century AD.

Today the temple that houses it is one of Buddhism's

most important sites of worship.

In keeping with the city's status,

Kandy's railway station is one of Sri Lanka's busiest.

The trains keep running, and running safely,

thanks to some very old school technology.

A signal cabin is a station's nerve centre

and this one, built by British firm Saxby and Farmer,

has changed little since it was installed well over a century ago.

Its solid iron levers, connected to semaphore signals

and points up to 400 yards away, were built to last.

And they have.

It's a demanding job, both mentally and physically.

Soon our blue train will be climbing again

deep into the tropical heart of Sri Lanka.

A lush landscape where in one month alone

they can harvest over 20 million kilos of tea.

We're in the city of Kandy, 75 miles into one of the world's

most scenic railway journeys through Sri Lanka.

Although our train will soon be heading onwards

towards Nine Arch Bridge,

one of the railway world's most stunning sights.

Most trains do an about turn at Kandy,

but some locomotives, and types of carriage, can only operate

facing one way, so they need to be physically switched around.

That's easier said than done.

Unless you have one of these.

A glorious piece of engineering that's over a century old.

WHISTLE BLOWS

Several times a day a distinctive ritual unfolds

just beyond the end of platform three at Kandy station.

Locomotives and carriages are flipped around

on this manually operated turntable,

manufactured in Manchester in the 1920s.

It's a vital part of the stationmaster operation.

Remarkably two men can turn a 60-tonne locomotive

in less than a minute.

There are no such problems for us, we're on the move,

and the rise...again.

The next stage of our journey takes us south from Kandy

through Hatton and its famous tea plantations

and on to Nanuoya, a 61-mile stretch

that will see us climb another 3,650 feet...

..as we head high into Sri Lanka's fertile Hill Country.

This climate is ideal for these plants.

We have 2,000mm of rainfall, which is twice the world average.

That's the reason that you have a lush greenery.

There's plenty of time to take in the tropical scenery.

Although our S12 class train has a top speed of 50mph,

on this journey we're averaging a leisurely 16.

If that sounds slow it's because we aren't always on the move.

If you want to experience rain travel in Sri Lanka,

you have to be mentally conditioned

for the stopovers and the slow journey.

If you're in a rush, the Main Line may not be for you.

It's mostly single track, so a lot of the time is spent in sidings

waiting for oncoming trains to pass.

There are also more stops than you might expect -

18 in the 61 miles between Kandy and Nanuoya.

At the small station of Watawala, 33 miles from Kandy,

keep your eyes peeled and you might see Heenbanda.

You could say he's a linesman for the county.

Heenbanda's been walking the line for 15 years.

It's a lonely occupation, but a vital one.

Lubricating the tracks doesn't just prevent derailments,

it's a money saver for the railway too.

The oil minimises the friction between the rails

and the train's wheels

which massively extends the rail's lifespan.

But that's not all that Heenbanda does.

He and his fellow linesman are the eyes and ears of the railway,

its first responders.

And their standard issue kit prepares them

for just about any eventuality.

A novel, but effective way, to prevent a disaster.

Even though the major cities of Colombo and Kandy are far behind us,

our second class carriage is still packed.

Squeezing themselves in are Swiss holidaymakers Janina and Fabio.

They're on their only break together this year

and they're trying something different.

I would say we are not train enthusiasts

and in Switzerland they're really expensive,

so that's why we are almost never travelling with trains.

They've chosen the perfect journey to change that.

So far the Main Line is delivering on its reputation

as one of the great scenic railway routes.

It's really nice going with the train because that route is

really, like, with a lot of nice landscape and really green.

I'm glad that we took the train.

It's cheap. It's a nice experience to stay with the local people.

It's not just a great experience, it's a very affordable one too.

Rail travel in Sri Lanka is an absolute bargain.

Like ridiculously cheap.

It's only cost like three euros, or something like that.

For three euros in Switzerland you could not even travel the train.

You could use the toilet for three euros. Yeah.

And not taking the train.

Really happy about that.

We're approaching the city of Hatton.

The climate is getting a little change.

It is getting a little cooler now.

Now we are reaching into the tea country.

More than 700 square miles of Sri Lanka,

an area than London, is dedicated to the cultivation of tea.

The entire mountains are like a green carpet.

It's always refreshing to see such greenery.

Especially when you're coming from Colombo.

Sri Lanka is the world's fourth biggest tea producer,

exporting 300,000 tonnes of the stuff each year,

with a value of more than £1 billion.

Not bad going for a country smaller than Ireland.

Industry veterans like Bernard put that success down

to a happy combination of skill and setting.

I have been in this game, or this business,

for the last 52 years.

Sri Lanka is great for growing tea.

I think the first primary thing would be the climate,

the geographic location is very important.

Distance from the equator, distance from the sea,

height above sea level. Site conditions, volcanic,

also very well suited to the growth of tea.

Tea plants need a lot of rainfall, a lot of water.

Fortunately our country is blessed with two monsoons.

We have in this area an average rainfall of 180 inches per annum.

So our country, our land, is ideally suited to grow tea.

Bernard's spent most of his career as a planter.

It's a misleading job title.

Planters don't plant, they run plantations.

As a producer of Ceylon tea, as Sri Lanka's is branded,

Bernard delivered arguably the finest in the world.

I think the difference between our teas

and a lot of other teas is that our teas are hand-picked.

It is the eye and the hand that can select the right type of tea to pick

and so our teas are always considered better

than many of the teas that are made by machine.

What you see there is that our pickers are harvesting the leaves.

The picker can pick anything from six, seven, eight kilos per day

to about 20, 40, 60, 80,

depending on climate and weather conditions.

There's an art to tea harvesting.

Every leaf plucked is carefully selected.

I'll just show you what we like to pick.

This is what you might call a two-leaf and a bud.

This is the ideal condition

we need to have the leaf in when we harvest.

That's the bud

and we like to harvest this leaf

because the tender leaves have all the good stuff in it.

Nothing is left to chance.

Each picking teams' progress around the plantation is precisely plotted.

We try and harvest our tea plants about once in eight days maybe.

We need to keep that cycle going

because we want to pluck only the young leaves.

Because it's the young tender leaf that produces a good tea.

All the phenols, the polyphenols, the enzymes, the flavonoids

they are all in these young leaves.

Leaves which come from plants like these ones only,

anything else and it's not the real deal.

People are confused because when they go to buy tea

there are hundreds of products pretending to be tea.

You know, rooibos, chamomile, lavender, that is not quite right.

That is not tea.

Tea comes from one plant, Thea Camellia sinensis,

which means, Thea means tea,

Camellia is the family it belongs to, sino means from China.

It's six-and-a-half hours since we left Colombo

and our train now travels to Pattipola,

the highest point on the line.

From there it'll pass an extraordinary town

trapped in time, before heading to a tropical paradise

that produces flowers destined for Europe.

It's early afternoon.

We've travelled 125 miles since we set out from Colombo.

And we're still gaining altitude as we head ever deeper

into Sri Lanka's Hill Country.

These apparently endless fields of tea aren't the only mark

the colonial British left on the local landscape.

Our next stop is Nanuoya.

Not far from here is the popular resort of Nuwara Eliya.

It's known as Little England,

because that's what it looks like to a...well, "tee".

Settling down for a cuppa is local Airbnb owner

and history buff, Dilshan.

Nuwara Eliya has this colonial look because it was built by the British.

Right now we are in front of the Grand Hotel.

This hotel is the house of the former fifth governor of Sri Lanka

and was built in 1829.

It's retained its British look pretty much intact,

even though the hotel has expanded a bit.

It's pretty much...

If we go inside the hotel it's the same as what it used to be.

Nuwara Eliya's origins are as British as Eccles cakes,

or moaning about the weather.

The city was founded in 1848 by Samuel Baker.

Baker later won fame for his exploration of the Nile.

Nuwara Eliya, on the other hand,

at more than 6,000 feet above sea level,

became British settlers favourite refuge from lowland

Sri Lanka's brutal summer heat.

Sri Lanka is a tropical country and it gets very warm during summer

and it's very difficult to stay in the lower altitudes

and since Nuwara Eliya is at a higher altitude,

we have a much cooler temperature here.

So that's why the British moved here so that they could do

their hunting and horse riding -

their pastimes in their home country.

The British did all they could to make it feel like home.

You would think you were in the UK because if you look

at the architecture. If you look at even the lawns,

and even the gardens, it pretty much resembles England.

Squint while taking a walk around the town's old colonial heart

and you could almost be in The Shires.

This is The Hill Club

and here's the golf club.

This is the Nuwara Eliya post office.

I've lived in Britain for about two years

and this reminds me a lot of my time back there

because it's...

Most of the buildings where I stayed is very similar to this.

This is about 150 years old, maybe.

The British colonised here in the late 1800s,

so it's been there since then.

You can see the company where it is made.

It's Derby, England, right?

So it's not been changed in any way.

It's just been painted and still here since the colonialists.

We've been travelling for nearly eight-and-a-half hours,

during which time we've covered 140 miles.

Now you can see we are getting closer to the summit.

We're into the final leg of our epic journey

into the mountainous heart of Sri Lanka.

Our train now heads to an area of flower produces near Diyatalawa.

And after travelling 160 miles from Colombo, reaches Ella,

our final station, just before the world-famous Nine Arch Bridge.

This is as high as the tracks will take us.

At Pattipola they reach 6,225 feet above sea level.

This is a world record.

Highest elevation reached by a broad gauge railway.

Things are looking up for our Swiss friends, Janina and Fabio too.

Actually we got a seat.

It's just great.

Just like really relaxing and you can really enjoy the landscape.

No, it's not what I expected about the train trip.

Yeah, it's much more better than we thought.

This path was well trodden before the railway was built,

but not by man.

The track follows a route originally used by wild elephants.

100 years ago Sri Lanka's elephant population was more than 10,000.

Today there are little more than half that number.

The best way to be sure to see one is a day trip

to the Elephant Transit Home in Udawalawe National Park.

At regular intervals throughout the day an expectant crowd gathers.

And dozens of elephants make their curtain call.

Feeding time at the Transit Home takes place

under the watchful eye of vet Malik.

If he's looking paternal, it's with good reason.

This place is for orphan elephants.

We are keeping them until they can survive themselves

and then we release them back to the wild.

We are feeding them every three-hour intervals.

We're starting from 6am and 9am,

12, 3pm and 6pm in the evening and even in the night,

ten o'clock and two.

Set up in 1995, the Transit Home is on the front line

in the fight to boost Sri Lanka's elephant numbers.

Sri Lankan elephant is an endangered species.

We have around 6,000 elephants in the country.

Because of human elephant conflicts,

there are around, er...

300 elephants are dying every year.

There are many causes for elephants getting orphaned,

mainly due to gunshot wounds,

snare wounds and some road traffic.

Those are the common causes for, um...

..elephants getting orphaned.

If they're lucky orphaned elephants get a second chance at life,

thanks to the Transit Home.

Normally we are getting ten to 15 elephants per year.

We have elephants, er,

from, er, two months to five years of age.

We started this place with one baby,

orphan baby elephant

and now we have 73 elephants.

Malik is on first name terms with every one of them.

This is the newcomer to our station.

She's around two-and-a-half years old.

Her mother died due to a...

..a gunshot injury last month

and we, er...

..brought her here last week.

The Transit Home's most important task is to nurse new arrivals

back to health, hence the regular feeding sessions.

What's on the menu might come as a surprise.

We are giving, er,

er, human baby formula for them.

And we are adding some supplements

for this, er, milk, er,

for to maintain their balance of nutrition.

Normally we are giving around three litres for one animal.

Small elephants they need more milk,

so they are, they are demanding

and they are asking for more milk here.

That's why they are screaming here and fighting with each other.

Feeding time is the elephants only interaction with people.

They spend the rest of their time running free

in the wildlife sanctuary of the neighbouring National Park.

It's all part of the plan to reintroduce them

to the wild when they're five.

They are in the herd during the daytime.

Um...

They are in the National Park as a herd

and we take them

to this place only for feeding.

It's a method that works.

Since 1995, the Transit Home has released

more than 120 elephants back into the wild.

It's a great pleasure to, er,

work with, er...

..this kind of rehabilitation programme.

It's really fun to work with the elephants.

Which is definitely something worth shouting about.

LOUD TRUMPETING

We're only 25 miles from our destination,

the fabled Nine Arch Bridge, near the mountain resort of Ella.

This final stretch of our journey is gently downhill,

but the views from our carriage are as stunning as ever.

The better scenery.

It took a long time for us to come here, but still worth the scenery.

There's more than just wild beauty on offer here though.

Isanda's nursery brightens up a hillside

near our stop at Diyatalawa.

It's part of a trade worth £11 million a year to Sri Lanka.

This is, um, petunia.

Petunia, see the beautiful petunia colours.

This is the red colour.

Peoples, er...

..like the red colour.

Isanda sells some of his plants in his own shop.

But he ships the rest for sale, perhaps even by your local florist.

Every evening his blooms are amongst dozens of containers of flowers

on the overnight train to Colombo.

If they're loaded at eight in the evening,

they can travel in the cool of the night

and be in the capital by six the next morning.

For many of the flowers the railway is just the beginning

of their journey.

Their next stop is the airport from where Isanda's blooms

travel as far afield as China, the United States and Britain.

Back on the train, the lush green hills surrounding us

are generating a cooling microclimate.

There's a softness to the air that means nobody minds it's taken

our express service, one of four to travel this route each day,

fully ten hours to cover 153 miles.

Our journey's nearly over though.

We're only 15 miles from our destination,

the hill station of Ella

and the iconic Nine Arch Bridge,

the celebrated Bridge In The Sky.

We're travelling through the lush tropical landscape of Sri Lanka's

southern Hill Country, 3,500 feet above sea level.

Some of the most stunning terrain

on one of the world's most beautiful islands.

It's been ten-and-a-half hours since we left the capital, Colombo.

And after 168 miles we're approaching our final stop.

We started with the sunrise and we are ending at the sunset.

We have reached Ella.

This is going to be the end of our journey.

We've spent the whole day travelling,

but I think it's a day well spent.

As soon as the train pulls in,

the platform is thronged with holidaymakers

eager to sample Ella's famous scenery.

But when the crowd clears it becomes evident

that the views actually begin at the platform.

This is no ordinary railway station.

But then Ashendra is no ordinary stationmaster.

The rose plant, my favourite plant is the rose.

Ashendra made it his mission to make sure his station

dazzles everyone who passes through it.

This is my garden, the railway station garden.

Foreigners is coming and they are wow!

They are very liking the garden, the very beautiful nature.

The garden is just one of many improvements

Ashendra has made since taking charge.

Maintenance is another.

You'd be hard pushed to find a more spotless station.

That's no accident.

At half past nine every morning Ella's platforms close to the public

and a spring cleaning frenzy begins.

Every inch of the station is buffed, swept, scrubbed and watered.

I have the nine staff.

They are in every day, two hours working in the cleaning,

in our garden and washroom, toilet and platforms.

All teams working today, every day in the morning, two hours.

in the station.

That hard work has won recognition for Ashendra and his team.

In 2014, Ella Station fought off stiff competition to win

a prestigious award.

Ella is the most beautiful railway station in Sri Lanka.

That is a sizeable feather in his cap.

Not that his uniform needs any...accessorizing.

I'm proud of Ella because foreigners from around the world come here.

I want foreigners' first impression in Ella

to be good because if they are happy, then I am very happy.

Beyond the station the landscapes around Ella are truly dazzling.

This is some of Sri Lanka's finest scenery.

It feels as if there's a lush mountain vista for each

and every one of the town's 45,000 inhabitants.

But for some intrepid travellers the adventure doesn't stop here.

Ella is the gateway for something even more spectacular.

Just a couple of miles up the track is the iconic Nine Arch Bridge,

a masterpiece of colonial era engineering completed in 1921.

Its 300-foot span soars 100 feet above the tropical valley floor.

It's a sight that dazzles the visitors.

And makes some take leave of their senses.

But it's also a huge source of pride to locals like Nimmo,

whose family runs a cafe beside the bridge.

I work with my family in the coffee shop.

I make juices, tea, coffee and soft drinks.

I also earn some more money from here because of the bridge.

Most people are coming to see this,

tourists and the locals.

Yeah, I like so much.

The British were the driving force behind the railway,

but its most spectacular sight is the brainchild of a Sri Lankan.

The colonialists originally wanted a bridge of metal and rivets,

but in the aftermath of the First World War,

steel was in short supply.

Then a local builder claimed he didn't need metal

to build the bridge.

The British people, they don't know how to build with this stone,

but one local guy, his name is PK Appuhami.

He was from Melimada, very close to Ella.

He knew how to make it with the stone.

I think they used stone and some concrete.

According to local folklore, Appuhami and his men

built Nine Arch Bridge in less than a year.

The British were sceptical that the new structure

would take the weight of a 100-tonne train.

So Appuhami put his life on,

or rather under, the line.

The British people said, no, we are not sure,

the train can't go.

He said, no, I'm sure.

You can go in the train. I'll guarantee.

And that time he goes under this bridge and sleeps.

History doesn't record how Appuhami slept.

But, importantly, he did wake up.

And his bridge is still standing proud almost a century later.

I tell people all come and see the bridge.

This is an amazing bridge and wonderful.

You must want to come to see this bridge in your life one time.

We've travelled 170 miles from Sri Lanka's West Coast.

We've crested mountain passes and journeyed through vast tea fields.

We've gazed upon history still thriving today.

And immersed ourselves in the beauty of this wonderful country.

All capped off by one of the railway world's

most stunning feats of engineering

- the Bridge In The Sky.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media