BANDARAWELA / HAPUTALE
Bandarawela is a large town located in the district of Badulla, in the province of Uva, Sri Lanka, 28 km from Badulla. Bandarawela is a famous retirement center due to the pleasant climate and access to local facilities, a busy market town that is a nice jump-off point to explore the surrounding region. With little to attract visitors, if you’re going east or further into the Hill Country, the city is a nice transport hub.
ATTRACTIONS IN BANDARAWELA AND HAPUTALE
LIPTON SEAT VIEW POINT
The name Lipton’s Seat says it all. It’s a famous 1970 m above sea level perspective. Sir Thomas Lipton used to sit and contemplate his plantation with its stony landscape and green tea bushes, this accurate place in the Haputale Mountains overlooking the Dambetenna Tea Estate.
DAMBATENNE TEA FACTORY
Built by the Scottish tea baron Sir Thomas Lipton in 1890. Dambatenne Tea Factory near Haputale and near the renowned Lipton Seat viewpoint. Now well-known as tea producers from Lipton.
The trip through the works is an education about the procedures engaged in the withering, rolling, fermentation, drying, slicing, sieving and grading of tea. It’s likely the most extensive tea-factory tour around, and you can then taste a best cup of tea from Sri Lanka.
ADISHAM BUNGALOW
Adisham Hall, or Adisham Bungalow, is a country house in the district of Badulla, Sri Lanka, close Haputale. It currently houses Saint Benedict’s Adisham monastery. It has St. Sylvester’s relic (a chip of a bone) at the chapel.
The house was constructed in 1931 by Sir Thomas Villiers, an English aristocrat and planter, former president of George Steuart Co, a Colombo-based trading and estate agency.
ST. ANDREW'S CHURCH
The story of this little brown church began even before World War I, when St. Andrew’s was another picturesque church on a hill, covered by the rising mists of Haputale. Most of his parishioners were British and local planters ‘ well-to – do families.
DOWA TEMPLE
A 4m-high standing Buddha cut into the rock face is the highlight of the charming Dowa Temple, 6 km west of the city. The neighboring cave shrine walls are covered with outstanding Sri Lankan-style Buddhist walls, sculpted from strong rock. It is said that during his 14-year exile from Anuradhapura, King Valagamba (Vattajamini Ahhhya) took refuge here in the 1st century BC. Legend also has it that from this temple a secret subterranean tunnel extends all the way to Kandy.