05:30hrs – The morning chanting of Kuda Kabilittha temple helped us to open our eyes early to continue our Kataragama pada yatra journey. While we were packing our stuffs, morning tea was prepared by our friends, meanwhile neighboring family offered us their nutritious sweet rice which I have mentioned earlier.
06:30hrs – Began the journey by worshipping Kuda Kabilittha temple. Until 08:30 we didn’t halt ourselves. We crossed Manik river twice like within 5KMs. We planned to cover 4 days journey in 3 days. Within the second day we must cover 2 days journey to accomplished. So we covered most of it in morning hours to escape the noon sun. Until 10:00 we drag the journey without jeewani and halt to refresh beside a lake. That was the final lake we found before Lin thuna (3 wells) camping site. Then we crossed that lake and the water level was around our waist at that time.
11:10 – The sun was raising above our shoulders so that we were so dull when we reached lin thuna. We were served by herbal tea and 2 leaf of breads. That herbal tea was a unique one for the kataragama pada yatra. An ayurvedic doctor prepared it using 40+ herbal plants. We were fully fueled up with the help of that tea and spent 40mins there. Medical camp from an NGO is also there to help people.
16:00 – Until 16:00hrs we walked along to take our lunch from Dansela conducted annually by Dalanda Maligawa (The temple of the tooth relic Kandy) we were getting only 4 breaks before the lunch while we were trekking. I just filled my belly twice and even that was not enough by that time.
16:55 – We left there and heading to our camping site Manik ganga river bank. At 1700hrs we were able to reach Manik ganga river bank. We could smell the human poop smell before 500-1000m we reached there. There were around 2000 people there on and beside the river bank. It was amazed to see some teenagers were playing volleyball on the river bank inside a properly build volleyball court. Even some groups were taking there sola power panels with them. We chose a proper place on the river to stretch our legs. Perfect Sunset was the only painkiller at that evening.
We spent another hour, took a bath and refreshed ourselves. As the first night we were treated by another family with soya and rice. That was more than enough to fulfill our bellies. That night we counted 13 fallen stars (satellites) on the sky while we were chatting on our mat staring at the sky. Some groups were singing all over the night. We closed our eyes while listening to their songs and that was my first ever camping night on a river with house full of memories.
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