The Kandy to Ella train, and how to actually get a seat

Here is how the line actually works, from the office that books it.

The classes, and which one you want

Sri Lankan trains on this route carry a mix of reserved and unreserved accommodation, and the mix varies by service.

First class observation saloon. A rear carriage with large windows, air conditioning on some services, and seats that on certain trains face backwards. Reserved, limited, and the first thing to sell. The windows on some observation cars are sealed and tinted, which is a real drawback if photography is the point of the day for you.

Second class reserved. Our usual recommendation, and the one we chase hardest. Windows open, doorways are accessible, fans overhead, and the carriage has the atmosphere that people came for. If you asked us to book one class and only one, this is it.

Third class reserved, where it exists on the service, is entirely pleasant on this line and cheaper again.

Unreserved second and third class. Always available, never sold out, and you may well stand. Not a disaster on a short section. A genuine trial over five or six hours with luggage.

Private carriages are attached to some services by tour operators and can be booked further ahead than the railway’s own reserved seats, at a considerably higher price. We use them when the standard classes have gone and the leg matters to you.

When reservations release, and why that is the whole problem

Reserved seats on the hill country line go on sale a limited number of days before departure, currently around 30 days, and in high season the good classes frequently sell out on the day of release. There is no way to buy earlier through the railway itself.

That release window is set by Sri Lanka Railways and it has moved before, so we confirm the current number for your dates rather than working from what was true last year. What has not changed is the behaviour it produces: a fixed, short window and far more demand than supply, which is why so many visitors are told the train is fully booked when they ask a hotel to sort it out a week ahead.

How we handle it, which is also how you would handle it yourself:

1. Lock the date first. The seat cannot be bought before the window opens, so the route has to be settled before then, not after.
2. Buy on the morning of release, not later that day.
3. If your booking with us sits outside the window, we hold the date in the itinerary and buy at the moment it opens.
4. If the reserved classes have gone, we move to a private carriage, or we change the section you travel, which is the option most people do not know they have. See below.

The resale sites that appear at the top of search results are buying the same tickets on the same day and adding a margin. They are not getting earlier access.

Direction, and which side of the carriage

Direction: Kandy to Ella, not the reverse, if you have a choice. You climb through the tea country rather than descending into the evening, the light is better through the middle of the journey, and the trip ends in a village where you will want to stay rather than in a city you have already seen.

Side of the carriage. Travelling south and east from Kandy towards Ella, the right-hand side has the better and more open views for the majority of the run, particularly across the Nanu Oya to Haputale to Ella stretch, where the valley drops away on that side. The left has its moments, notably some of the tea estate slopes above the line.

Two honest qualifications. Seat numbering does not map neatly to a side, so a reserved seat is a reserved seat rather than a guaranteed view, and people move around constantly in second class anyway, which is part of the pleasure of the carriage. And the views are two-sided often enough that the wrong side is not a ruined day. It is a preference, not a rule.

One thing that is a rule. Hanging out of the open doorway for a photograph is how people are injured and killed on this line every year, by rock cuttings, bridge sides and oncoming trains. There is a well-known photograph everyone wants and it is not worth what it periodically costs. Sit down.

How long it really takes

Slower than the schedule suggests, and much slower than the distance suggests. The line is single track, steeply graded and full of curves, and it is normal for a service to lose time across the day.

Add the transfer time at each end. Nanu Oya station is roughly 20 to 30 minutes from Nuwara Eliya, and Ella station is in the village but your hotel may not be. A “seven-hour train” is realistically a nine-hour day.

Timings on this line change with the annual timetable, so we confirm the specific service and its departure time when we book rather than publishing a schedule here that will drift.

Should you do the whole leg, or a shorter section?

This is the question we are asked least and should be asked most.

Our answer for most travellers: do Nanu Oya to Ella, not Kandy to Ella.

The stretch from Kandy up to Nanu Oya is a pleasant four to five hours through farmland and forest with some good stretches. It is not the famous part. The famous part is the higher section from around Nanu Oya through Haputale to Ella, where the line runs along the contour of the tea slopes with the valley open below it. That section is under three hours, and it contains almost everything people came for, including the Nine Arch Bridge outside Ella.

Doing the shorter section buys you three things:

• Half a day back, which on a twelve-day trip is a real gain.
• A much better chance of a reserved seat, because shorter sections are easier to place people on.
• The option of unreserved seating being survivable. Standing for two and a half hours in a doorway-open carriage through the best scenery on the line is genuinely fine. Standing for seven hours is not.

Your car and driver take the road with the luggage and meet you at the other end, which is how we build it. Nobody carries a suitcase through a crowded carriage.

When we would do the whole leg anyway. If trains are the point of the trip for you rather than a means of getting somewhere. If you are travelling in the quiet months and reserved seats are easy. Or if the day is otherwise empty and you would rather spend it on a train than in a car, which is a perfectly good reason.

When we would skip the train entirely. Very young children on a full-day service with no reserved seats, and anyone who needs a reliable toilet and a guaranteed seat. In those cases the road through the tea estates with stops of your choosing is a better day, and we say so. See Sri Lanka with children.

Plan this trip

Tell us your dates and we will hold the train leg in the itinerary and buy the seats the morning they release. Free first proposal, non-generic, no obligation.

Start planning →

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