We pushed out of the mountains, and over the next three hours we passed small and well-kept British-era railway stations like Galboda and Watawala, which were built solely for the purpose of transporting tea from each estate. We sluggishly ascended past Hindu temples tucked in tea gardens, small housing settlements where the tea estate labourers live, and turpentine forests shrouded in swirling mist. Sometime after leaving Hatton – the gateway town to Adam's Peak, a holy mountain for pilgrims of all faiths – we entered the Poolbank Tunnel, the longest of the 46 tunnels at more than half a kilometre in length.
