Ranga de Silva

The infernal stairs, as Wirendra calls the stone steps leading up from Ratnapura to the top of Siripada. Imagine climbing a steep staircase consisting more than five thousand stairs for over eight hours. Coming back down, it had rained the previous night and the steps were insanely slipperly. Though it wasn’t as exhausting as going up. I’ve now developed a tiny fear of staircases after this trip…

Please note that all images in this blog are the property of the photographer. No one may use these images without written permission from the photographer. The fact that it’s on the internet is not an excuse for you to steal it. Legal action will be taken against anyone using these images without permission from the photographer.

If you are interested in using these photographs, please email (rangad.silva[at]gmail.com) me for permission.

Meet Karunadasa. He’s the caretaker at the top of Siripada. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I took a trip to the top of Siripada during the off season last year with some friends. Well it wasn’t your average hike. But once we got to the top, Karunadasa treated us to some warm tea and aggala. You have no idea how good that tea tasted after the long climb in the freezing rain. Karunadasa spends most of his time alone during the off season and hardly gets many visitors since the trip up to Siripada is quite hazardous during that time of the year. So when we got there he was quite the chatter box.

On a slightly separate note. A couple days prior to our visit, some people from Trinco had come to Siripada and had told Karunadasa that they never knew such places existed in the country and were quite amazed. Hopefully with the ending of the war, every one of us will be able to travel to places in the island we never knew existed. Ah, so many places to see, so little cash for petrol…..

Please note that all images in this blog are the property of the photographer. No one may use these images without written permission from the photographer. The fact that it’s on the internet is not an excuse for you to steal it. Legal action will be taken against anyone using these images without permission from the photographer.

If you are interested in using these photographs, please email (rangad.silva[at]gmail.com) me for permission.

I’m still not done editing all the pics of Segiriya from my “Radical Road Trip” (ya! that’s what my friends call it). I’ve uploaded some to flickr but there’s more. So until I’m done with them, this one’s from another trip to Siripada during the off season.

Was quite a treacherous trip for both my equipment and myself. I never would have made it to the top without my friends helping me out. When I got to the top my point and shoot simply refused to start and the lens on my DSLR had fogged up. Hence the blurry picture of everyone huddled up inside the caretakers’ cabin.

Oh, you might notice I’ve uploaded a bigger picture than usual. I’m not sure if this is entirely a wise decision given that people with slow connections might have to wait a while for the picture to download. If there’s anyone who actually visits this blog and thinks that the old size was good enough please let me know.

Please note that all images in this blog are the property of the photographer. No one may use these images without written permission from the photographer. The fact that it’s on the internet is not an excuse for you to steal it. Legal action will be taken against anyone using these images without permission from the photographer.

If you are interested in using these photographs, please email (rangad.silva[at]gmail.com) me for permission.