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Cubicle Dreamin': Sipping Tea at Sri Lanka's Tea Factory Hotel

Where: Kandapola, NUWARA ELIYA, Sri Lanka

Cubicle Dreamin' is a feature in which we ask the hotel mavens to take some time out of their busy work day, surf the Internet, and tell us what hotel they wish they could beam themselves to right that very second--all on the slave driving companies dime, of course. Oh, like these people aren't surfing aimlessly anyway--at least now their purposeless clicking will be cobbled together into useful hotel stories--we hope. Have a destination hotel you are just dying to leave your cube for? Send the story our way.

In this episode, Hotel Maven Amanda K heads to Sri Lanka...in her mind. Enjoy.

If I'm dreaming of a really great hotel destination, then the hotel itself has to be a bit special for me. Not designer-toiletries or Michelin-star-restaurant kind of special: I love a hotel that's got a bit of a story behind it. And I particularly like hotels that didn't start out life as a hotel.

Which is why The Tea Factory in Sri Lanka appeals to me. You won't be surprised to know that it was originally a tea factory, and of course it once produced particularly fine Ceylon tea. The factory was built during the 1930s (in grand colonial style) and in 1992, when its future as anything was uncertain, it was taken over by the Aitken Spence group and turned into a luxury hotel.

It is now a 57-room luxury hotel with views over the hills where tea still grows--the rooms were actually the original withering lofts where tea leaves dried before they made it into packets and onto your breakfast table. The rooms sound pretty luxurious with most mod cons (no mention of Wifi though but after all you are in the middle of the Sri Lankan hills) although they do list one worrying sounding facility: all rooms have piped music. I'm starting to picture a tea ad and that supposedly peaceful tea drinking music drifting into my room constantly, and I'm not quite sure that's what I want. But that's nothing that a good cup of tea wouldn't fix.

On top of all that, I don't even need to dream too hard about a stay at The Tea Factory--for all its luxury, the prices are downright cheap: $70 for a double room with breakfast, or $127 if you get all meals (and cups of tea) included.

[Photo: Pink_Buddha]

Related Stories:
· Five Best Factory Hotels [UK Independent]
· Hotels in Sri Lanka [HotelChatter]
· Travel Stories in Sri Lanka [Jaunted]