Lipton's Seat Cycling Descent with the Dambatenne Tea Factory in Ella

The road from Dambatenne up to Lipton's Seat climbs about seven kilometres through the estate on continuous switchbacks. Riding up it would be a serious morning's work. Riding down it, having been driven up for sunrise, is one of the best hours on a bicycle in Sri Lanka.

Lipton's Seat sits at around 1,970 metres. Thomas Lipton bought his first Ceylon estates in 1890 and, as the story goes, rode up to this outcrop to look out over what he had bought; there is a statue of him there now. On a clear morning the view runs across five provinces to the southern plain, and by nine or ten the valley fills with cloud and there is nothing to see — which is why this trip starts before dawn.

The descent runs through the estate with the tea on both sides and pluckers starting work as you pass. It is steep enough to need brakes and gentle enough to need no pedalling.

Dambatenne, at the bottom, is the factory Lipton built and one of the oldest working plants in the country. The tour follows the leaf from withering trough through rolling, oxidation and firing to the grading table, and finishes with a cup.

Back in Ella by early afternoon.

Ceylon tea grows between about 600 and 2,000 metres in the central highlands, planted by the British from the 1860s after coffee blight wiped out the earlier crop, and the estates still run much as they did: pluckers, mostly Tamil women, take the two leaves and a bud by hand, and the factory withers, rolls, ferments and fires the leaf the same day. Factory tours take about 45 minutes and end with a tasting of the grades; the good ones are working factories rather than showrooms. Lipton's Seat above Haputale is the viewpoint where Thomas Lipton surveyed his estates, best before the cloud arrives at about 10:00. Nuwara Eliya, at 1,868 metres, is the coldest town on the island and needs a jacket at night.