This lovely tea plantation in the hills above Koggala provides free tea estate tours that are quite instructive. You’ll be able to sample and learn about over 25 different types of tea, including the renowned Virgin White tea, which is created from the tiniest and newest leaves. Whereas the average large plantation worker picks 23kg of black tea each day, these laborers only achieve 150 grams of virgin white leaves. A 131-kilometer post identifies it as being 6 kilometers inland from the seaside roadway.
Herman Gunaratne, a legendary figure in the island’s tea industry, owns Handunugoda. Pick up a copy of Gunaratne’s autobiography, The Suicide Club: A Virgin Tea Planter’s Journey, which is a surprisingly interesting and instructive book about his life, tea, and Sri Lanka from the end of the British Raj to the present.