Sri Lanka Has Rock. Why Are There So Few Climbing Areas?
Without traffic, it takes less than an hour to drive from Colombo, Sri Lanka’s capital city, to the 18-acre Kodigahakanda Sanctuary—a former coconut plantation that’s now home to the country’s only established rock climbing area, as well as numerous porcupines, mouse deer, purple-faced leaf monkeys, and at least 53 species of butterfly.
Last December, I went out to Kodigahakanda with Jayanthi Kuru-Utumpala, who in 2016 became the first Sri Lankan to summit Everest. A bright, energetic woman sporting a pixie cut greeted me in her lovely flat, decorated with houseplants and art prints. She was easy to talk to, like meeting an old friend. As she steered assuredly through the morning maze of tuk-tuks, past coconut and fruit vendors, she told me that she’d first been exposed to climbing during her university days in Brighton, in the UK. The experience, along with the community it drew her into (notably, the “Vertgirls” climbing group at Brighton), prompted her to enroll in a month-long military-style high-altitude boot camp with India’s Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in 2003. During the course, Jayanthi climbed Mount Frey (19,329 feet) and BC Roy Peak (17,979 feet), in India’s Sikkim region; she then went on to climb Imja Tse, a.k.a. Island Peak, (20,210 feet) in Nepal, in 2012, and Kilimanjaro (19,341 feet) in 2014—unthinkable altitudes for most people hailing from an island country like Sri Lanka. She then turned her sights on Everest, succeeding via the South Col route in 2016. Shortly afterwards, she learned something remarkable: Only in three other countries—South Africa, Croatia, and Poland—have women stood on the summit of the world before men. Jayanthi had made Sri Lanka the fourth.
Everest was a childhood dream, she told me as we drove, and a personal one—she never intended to be the “first” at anything. “‘The mountain chooses you,’ as they say in Nepal.” What she hadn’t anticipated is how climbing Everest linked her 18-year career in gender advocacy with her love for all things adventurous. “I’ve never been a public person. But so many schools wanted me to speak to the kids, and I figured I might as well take the opportunity to share my experience, even if what I say helps just a few individuals.”
Although Sri Lanka, which was called Ceylon until it achieved independence from the British in 1948, may sound quite far-flung, it’s long been a destination relished by backpackers for its jungle safaris and pristine beaches. Tourism constitutes as much as 12% of the national GDP. But unlike the rest of the world, this tropical island’s recent challenges have surpassed a mere global pandemic.
Sri Lanka is currently enduring its worst economic crisis in six decades. The end of a 26-year civil war in 2009, which pitted the majority Singhalese population against the Tamil minority, left the country reeling from deep wounds. Corruption, poor tax policies, and pandemic-stalled tourism have caused rampant inflation and repeated currency devaluations, leading to dire shortages in food, medicine, and fuel.
Though many Sri Lankans have been forced to emigrate in search of jobs, many more remain proud of just how much abundance their homeland offers. Hiking is a popular pastime for tourists and locals alike; surfing has been a major sport in Sri Lanka for at least half a century. And for those with a keen eye for good rock, there seems to be a significant amount of granite and gneiss on the island. And virtually no one has climbed it.
Indeed, the sport is so under-developed that climbing in Sri Lanka, a nation of 22 million people, owes its existence to one man: Sachith Samuditha, the 39-year-old founder of ClimbLanka, a guide service and school that’s the only Sri Lankan company dedicated to the sport.
That’s where Jayanthi was taking me—to meet and climb with Sachith.
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