Ambewela, Sri Lanka
We leave what feels like the last vestiges of civilisation as we turn off the road at Ambewela and start to bounce down a very rough dirt track, following a sign to Warwick Gardens, our lodging for the night.
The final mile requires nerves of steel as the crumbling earth and eroded rocks that form what only the most optimistic would call a road weaves down and then back up precipitous drops until we come to the bizarre sight of a 130-year old English country mansion hidden in a forgotten valley.
We are greeted by Viji, the butler, and invited to take tea on the lawn. Kingsley - who has accompanied tourists all over Sri Lanka in his career - looks totally bemused, having never heard of this place and taken his life in his hands getting us here without the car rolling down the mountain. He also looks very cold indeed as we put on the cardigans we have with us from wintery Europe and informs us the next morning, with amazement, that the temperature overnight had dropped to just 4 degrees centigrade, something he had never experienced in his life.
Once Viji has served us tea and instructed Kingsley where to find the chauffeur's quarters he disappears into the house, leaving Coman and I sitting in the chilly air of the garden wondering what happens next. Are we going to be shown to a room, is there a check-in process, where have our bags gone, are we the only people here?
A little exploration of the downstairs reveals an immaculately maintained drawing room with grand piano, a library-cum-study, hallways with cabinets full of fine porcelain and glassware, and a dining room with a crystal chandelier and large dining table laid out for eight guests.
In the eccentric silence we encounter a woman who bows, then introduces herself as Mina and reveals she's the housekeeper. She too vanishes. It has all the makings of an Agatha Christie novel about to unfold.
Eventually Viji reappears to ask us what we want for dinner, suggesting chicken, mashed potato and boiled vegetables from their allotment which will be served at 7.30pm. He then announces he will show us to our room and leads us up the staircase whereupon he pulls aside a large tapestry to reveal a secret staircase and behind it a sumptuous suite with a huge bathroom.
Coman takes one look at the inviting bed and decides he is going to have a nap, proceeding to sleep for the next two hours. I go for a walk around the grounds and bump into a man with a big hat, who turns out to be Faris, the estate manager who rediscovered the house as a dilapidated ruin in the middle of overgrown rainforest in 2002. He restored it to its former glories over the course of six years, turning it from a complete wreck without infrastructure into the boutique hotel it is today.
Local villagers helped rebuild the land into a sustainable environment which now grows its own produce, with terraced vegetable plots, tea bushes, coffee plants and orchards spread throughout the valley. Warwick Gardens grows pomegranates, peaches, figs, strawberries, guava, apples, pears, even gooseberries and has its own cows and bee hives.
The one thing it doesn't have is wifi or a phone signal, with just an antique phone providing its only contact with the outside world. Landscaped and luxurious it may be, but it's about as remote as it gets. Faris chats briefly but is heading over to the farm so I retire upstairs, to revel in our splendid isolation.
Three hours later, at our allotted time of 7.30, we descend to find two guests already seated at dinner. Karl and Heicke are from Heidleberg, and most definitely not given to small talk. We do establish however that it's Karl's 60th birthday and they are off to the Maldives in two days time.
The remaining guests then join us, a Chinese family all chattering away in Mandarin. God, this is going to be a long evening! We order more wine and gulp it down, trying in best PR style to get some form of dinner-table conversation going.
Fortunately the Chinese family are now based in Melbourne and while the parents Leo and Chin speak English with a very heavy, and at times unintelligible accent, their sons Tim (19) and Jeff (8) are more fluent with an Aussie twang creeping through.
Trying to create lively chatter between reticent Germans at one end of the table and faltering Chinese at the other proves a Herculean task and we're relieved when Karl and Heicke head to bed after 45 minutes.
However we hit it off rather well with our Chinese friends and manage to discuss everything from tuition fees to home ownership, life under Communism to Australian immigration, the slums in Mumbai to the worryingly fluctuating climate of Australia where in Melbourne it can be 45 degrees one day and 10 the next.
Tim is reading law and commerce at university and little Jeff is a witty and articulate young man who loves studying French and chemistry. He takes a particular shine to us, even getting up especially early the next morning to have breakfast with us, and is very impressed when I show him a picture of me with Meghan Trainor who is an absolutely massive star in Australia.
That night we sleep with an extra blanket on the bed, something we didn't think we'd need in the heart of the Tropics!
