Amba Estate: an Idyllic Sri Lankan Tea Plantation Stay

For full transparency, we were hosted by Amba Estate for a two-night stay with tea experiences included. As always, the opinions given in this post are how we genuinely felt about our time here.

A trip to Sri Lanka is just incomplete without tasting a cup of the locally grown tea. If you only stay on the coast, you’re going to miss the mountainous centre of the country is full of beautiful tea plantations.

And if you travel to the likes of Kandy, Ella, Nuwara Eliya, your tuktuk (or more adventurous local bus) will be driving right through some of Sri Lanka’s most spectacular scenery covered in tea bushes.

But which tea plantation should you go for?

This was the problem we were stuck with! If you search for them online, there are literally HUNDREDS to choose from.

Well, we did a lot of digging, and we can tell you that Amba Estate is THE one to choose.

Not only can you visit the tea plantation and factory, you can go for a tea tasting with food pairings (yeah, exactly like you would get with fancy wines!), and you can get meals and coffee made from produce grown on their organic farm.

The estate is in a beautiful and quiet area with outrageous panoramic views over Ella, there are loads of hiking opportunities, and super cute resident dogs. Henrietta (the dog) will show you the best hiking paths!

And you can stay on site and have the best night’s sleep you’ll probably have in Sri Lanka. Full stop.

So, this isn’t just a tea plantation, this is a whole experience! Here’s everything you need to know, plus a cheeky 5% discount code for when you book your accommodation.

Tours & Experiences

Farm Tour

Each day at 11am, Amba Estate runs a farm tour. One of their tea specialists will show you around the plantation, the viewpoint over Ella, the factory, and teach you all about tea and the estate.

The tour ends with a tea tasting. There is no need to book this up in advance, just turn up and someone will show you around. Dead casual, yet super informative. Priyanka gave us a great intro to beautiful Amba Estate!

Cost: $6 per person

Teaology

We have never experienced anything like this before. A tea tasting with food pairings is so unique, exactly like you would get with a fancy wine tasting! Make sure to mention beforehand if you are vegetarian as there is one dish that contains fish, but there is a veg alternative if you let them know.

The first and most challenging step for me in the tea tasting was learning how to actually drink the tea.

It’s not just a case of placing the cup to your lips and taking a wee sip.

There’s a whole slurping situation that incorporates air into the tea and makes sure the flavour gets to all your tastebuds. You’ll get the hang of it!

You sip the tea by itself and analyse the flavours to start with, and then combine it with some food for the second sip. And suddenly the flavour has completely changed. This is super unique and a proper foodie thing to do!

Make sure you book this in advance. Ashok is THE tea master and knows EVERYTHING there is to do with tea.

Cost: $30 per person

Hands-On Tea Making Experience

This was really good fun and so interesting to see the entire process from the very beginning to the very end.

We started by learning how to identify which leaves to pluck on a tea bush, and then we were handed a wee basket and guided through the plantation to collect our own tea leaves.

Once we had some leaves, we weighed them (we had to be given a little bit of help with some extra leaves from the tea experts because we did a sub-par job!) and then we laid them out in the factory to wither.

The next day, we went down to the factory, and the majority of leaves had withered enough to be processed (AKA 20 minutes of bashing with a monster pestle and mortar!).

This was some serious exercise – get working on your shoulders before you head to Amba Estate and get ready to get a sweat on. (They will help you out if you need a hand.)

I can proudly say that I pounded the tea leaves for the whole 20 minutes, but it was tough. Then we gathered up the pounded tea leaves to place into a bag to then oxidise. Once oxidised, the leaves are dried; and there you have your own proper tea!

We had Madu talk us through the whole process and she was so knowledgeable and super friendly.

Amba Estate also runs other hands-on tours, and farm and village experiences, so give them a shout on Instagram to hear about all the available options.

And take a look at the reel we created on Instagram about our time at Amba Estate!

✅ Use code ‘RR5%’ to get 5% off your stay ✅

Home-Cooked Meals

The organic farm and tea plantation is where Amba Estate sources the vast majority of the produce for the meals served on site. It’s something huge like 70-80% (!), and that remaining 20-30% is sourced from the local villages surrounding the estate, so you know that you are eating proper food.

Breakfast is a selection of Sri Lankan classics such as hoppers and sambol or pancakes stuffed with coconut and treacle, etc. plus fruit, curd and treacle, homemade bread with homemade jams (the passionfruit, papaya and vanilla was my fave but Chris loved the mango and ginger jam), and of course tea and coffee. The jams, teas and coffees can be bought at the on-site shop.

Not only is the food good, organic and tasty, it’s served in this beautiful outdoor space that has views over Lipton’s Seat!

We had our lunch at the café, and if you only order one thing from here, it absolutely has to be the pumpkin soup with coconut roti and sambol.

And I know you’re thinking ‘pumpkin soup? Why would I go all the way to Sri Lanka and order pumpkin soup?’

Just trust me. It tastes more like a fragrant curry than a boggo boring soup like you’d get back in the west. And with the coconut roti and punchy coconut sambol – just yeah. No words.

In the evenings, dinner is usually rice and curry. Each evening, we tried at least six different veg curries, plus rice, poppadom, and a dessert. Sri Lankan cuisine is naturally very vegetarian-friendly, and with all the veg being organic and local, you just know that this tastes phenomenal.

If you’re not into spice, no worries; the curries aren’t hot just super flavourful. If you like it spicy, give them a heads-up before. And if curry really isn’t your thing, make sure you give the guys plenty of notice so that they can prepare something else for you.

And if you’re a big old foodie like us and you’d like to get a sneak peek into the kitchen, you can get a cooking demonstration. We spent half an hour with the amazing chef Nalani while she talked us through her dal recipe. They even sell the curry powder at the on-site shop! And then we tasted the dal in the evening – it was a straight 10!

Accommodation

We loved the fact that you can stay on-site of this beautiful Sri Lankan tea plantation! There are about 20 rooms across the estate:

• the 100 year-old farmhouse
• the original tea-workers’ quarters linerooms
• the 1930s planters’ bungalow Clove Tree House
• the new annex Clove Tree Cottage

We stayed in Kithul double room in Clove Tree Cottage and absolutely recommend it. Rooms are airy and spacious with a huge bathroom. The bed is big and comfy, the decor is simple and old-timey, and the area is just SO unbelievably quiet and dark at night. We slept really well!

And our favourite part was the cute outdoor seating area with views over the valley to Lipton’s Seat!

Even though we didn’t stay at the farmhouse, we had a look around, and it has so much historic charm. It’s the sort of place that would be amazing to hire out the whole house for a larger group of say eight people.

The rooms are all centred off a lounge area, and there’s a dining area and kitchen. Yeah, it’s a really nice spot.

Spending at least two nights at Amba Estate gives you enough time to explore the grounds, taste all the tea and have a go at the entire process yourself, hike to some beautiful viewpoints, as well as have time to slow down and relax.

Hikes & Dogs

There are several hikes that you can do right from Amba Estate including Ella Rock, Eagle Rock, Ravana waterfall viewpoint, and a spot for a river swim. Each route has a map and instructions, but you likely won’t need these if Henrietta comes with you!

Henrietta is a sweet and gentle dog who lives on site with her two babies, and they are all SO friendly. They know the routes and love to go hiking and pose for photos at the viewpoints. They showed us the way up to Eagle Rock and posed for photos at the top.

Ethics

This was a top priority for us because we had heard some horror stories of the poor working conditions, treatment, and wages of tea workers in Sri Lanka, but Amba Estate doesn’t follow this unethical model.

The tea workers at Amba are artisans. This is their craft and they are highly skilled at making the most delicious teas.

They receive fixed salaries instead of salaries based on the weight of the tea picked per day, and then everyone receives a revenue share bonus on top.

Amba Estate runs initiatives with the local communities to encourage them to set up businesses and help them learn new skills. And they work alongside Planeterra and G Adventures, organisations which focus on ethical, sustainable and responsible tourism practices.

Amba Estate is more of a social enterprise and community-based project, and you can just feel it when you visit.

How to Get to Amba Estate

Although Amba Estate has views over Ella, it is actually located just outside of Ella in  Ambadandegama. The easiest way to get here is to actually travel by tuktuk.

Get yourself to Ella or Bandarawela, and then from there jump in a tuktuk for the thirty-minute journey. The roads get a little narrow in parts (not like you’re going to fall off the edge of a cliff narrow, more like rural one-way roads around Cornwall/Devon/Somerset in England) so I’d recommend a tuktuk over a car.

Otherwise, the nearest train station is Heel Oya, so you could get yourself there and then jump in a tuktuk.

Take a look at our Sri Lankan transport guide so you’re well-prepared!

When leaving Amba Estate, the guys that work there will be able to help you out with arranging a lift if you haven’t got something sorted already.

Why You Should Visit Amba Estate

Amba Estate has the most unique tea experiences we have seen at any tea plantation in Sri Lanka. The meals are mainly cooked with the organic produce from the farm, which means everything tastes great! The accommodation and the views are beautiful.

The whole area is such a great place to slow down and relax and connect with nature. Particularly if you’ve got a hurried itinerary across Sri Lanka, Amba Estate is a great place to stop for a couple of nights to relax.

Because it’s right by Ella (which is almost guaranteed to be on your itinerary unless you’re only planning on scooting along the coast), you don’t even have to go out of your way to get there.

And even if you came up into the hill country for Amba Estate alone, you’d be making a great choice!

But not only are there a ton of benefits for you as the visitor, you’re also contributing to keeping Sri Lanka’s tea culture alive, boosting the salaries of the tea artisans, and supporting a project that is working to do good.

Have More Questions?

If you have any more specific questions on Amba Estate, give us a shout!

Follow us on Instagram @relentlessroaming and send us a direct message, or send us an email at hello@relentlessroaming.com.

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• Kandy to Ella Train: Review & Tips to Not Be Disappointed
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