Introduction
St. Clair's Falls is billed as Sri Lanka's Nayagara, or 'king of waterfalls' due
to its outstanding beauty. It is 80m in height and at 50m wide, and consists of
two segments, known as 'Big St. Clair' and 'Small St. Clair'. Created by the Kotmale
River, a tributary of the Mahaweli River, it flows down a slope through an abandoned
tea estate that covers hundreds of hectares. It is one of six falls affected by
the upper Kotmale hydro-power station.
It is situated 3 km west of the town of Talawakele on the Hatton-Talawakele Highway
in Nuwara Eliya District. The falls derived its name from a nearby tea estate. St.
Clair's Fall is 80m high and hence 20th highest waterfall in Sri Lanka. St. Clair's
falls comprises two falls called "Maha Ella" (Sinhalese "The Greater Fall") and
"Kuda Ella," (Sinhalese "The Lesser Fall") which is 50m high and was created by
a tributary of Kotmale Oya.
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