If your morning ritual features tea leaves being popped into a pot, then visiting a tea plantation should form part of any journey through Sri Lanka.
Surfers and Buddhists may not need to read on - you have your own reasons for visiting an island fast becoming one of the Indian Ocean's tourist treasures. The end of the civil war has helped. A burgeoning market has emerged, now visitors realise their chances of being blown to smithereens are negligible.
The idea to visit the origins of the morning brew came from former Wairarapa Bush first five-eighths Neil "Footy" Foote, who coaches the first XV at Trinity College, a rugby-mad school in Kandy, a city in Sri Lanka's highlands. Footy and I met at a cricket practice during the World T20 because New Zealand captain Ross Taylor wanted to meet his Masterton boyhood hero. Footy said Sanjaya, a tea plantation manager and parent of 10-year-old twin boys at his school, would host a tour.
Our arrival, after an hour's drive, coincided with a sumptuous lunch of samosas, Sri Lankan style-rocky road and, naturally, tea, which was poured through a strainer amid much ceremony.
Later, at dinner, the airy dining room with its mood lighting, vaulted ceiling, full place settings and immaculate servants channelled a Sri Lankan version of Downton Abbey. I felt a tad underdressed in polo shirt, cargo shorts and sandals but that hardly seemed to matter once Sanjaya rolled his "tea" trolley into the drawing room for pre-dinner drinks. A bottle of decent whisky was the tipple of choice for hosts and guests alike throughout the evening.