We just returned from a 12-day trip to Sri Lanka and the Maldives. We had a private guide who drove us all around Sri Lanka for 8 days and our first stop was Dambulla. First off, if you ever visit Sri Lanka, make sure you hire a driver! The roads are narrow, at times unpaved, and filled with dogs, cows, pedestrians, school kids, people on bikes, tour buses, tuk tuks, etc. Everybody passes everybody else even when there is heavy oncoming traffic and people pull out into heavy traffic without even looking. It's absolutely crazy but somehow all the drivers manage to work together and everybody gets where they need to go. Below is a picture of a group of cows in the road.
Here is a typical street in Dambulla. Yes, this is two-way! People make way for each other, pass each other, etc. This road has houses on each side of it alternating with areas of forest and rice fields. You could often see people out in their yards hanging laundry, burning their trash, or chatting with neighbors. There were larger, more dangerous roads but I never got a good picture of them.
Our first stop, to break up the 4-hour drive from the Colombo airport to Dambulla (which would take 2 hours in Germany on "normal" roads), was at a restaurant for breakfast. Every restaurant in Sri Lanka serves many different fresh fruit juices. Below is a picture of our banana and pineapple juices we had that morning. Both were delicious.
Our hotel in Dambulla was the Amaya Lake. Here we saw our first iguana and small squirrel (I think they look like chipmunks from the northeastern US but with fluffier tails):
We also saw our first water monitor on the road near Dambulla. They're huge! They live near water and we saw quite a few of these on some of our boat trips. There is also a land monitor, which lives on the land but they are vegetarians and smaller than then water monitors.
The obligatory shot of my feet in front of the hotel pool. The hotel was deserted during the day because everybody is part of either a private or large-group tour. So everybody gets picked up at the hotel between 7 and 9am, and is gone until 5-6pm. So when you're at the hotel mid-day, you have the whole place to yourself. This is where we spent our first afternoon while we battled our jet lag.
The next day we were picked up at 8am and taken to Polonnaruwa, which is the second-oldest city in Sri Lanka and a UNESCO World Heritage site. It was built in the 12th century and was only the capitol until sometime in the 13th century, so it didn't last very long but it left behind many well-maintained ruins.
Sri Lanka is filled with statues, mostly of the Buddha. And you have to respect the statues - you're not allowed to take a picture of a statue with anybody else in the picture because it's a sign of disrespect. But sometimes our guide said it was okay ... I don't understand the rules.
In this case, the statue's head was cut off during the Chola (southern Indian) invasion so it was okay to take its picture with the group of schoolchildren all in it:
This statue was just along the road on the way to Polonnaruwa. They're everywhere.
Below is the Kiri Vihara, which is a dagoba. A dagoba is a mound which holds the relics of a sacred person and it is believed that the Kiri Vihara was dedicated to Subhadra, the queen of King Parakramabahu (1153-1186). There is no entrance to a dagoba - you just have to believe that the sacred relics are in there. Its name means "milk white shrine".
After wandering around the ruins for awhile, we took a break for lunch. Lunch every day was a buffet at a roadside restaurant. The buffet always included dhal, which is a red lentil curry. Sometimes it was mild and sometimes too spicy to eat but we ate it for at least one meal every single day. Most Sri Lankans are vegetarians and I think it's safe to say that dhal is their national dish. Below are a few pictures of my lunches and part of a buffet. Everything was always delicious, and usually new to us. Desserts were weird (to us) though and we didn't like anything we tried. There was a lot of use of gelatin and palm tree syrup.
That afternoon, we went on an elephant safari. We learned that elephants don't really like sunlight so they were hard to find. It took about an hour before we found a group of about 10 female elephants with some babies and then we followed them around for awhile. I think if we had come earlier or later in the day we would have seen a lot more. Sri Lanka used to be filled with elephants but when the British took over the country they hunted them for sport and killed off 85% of the population. Sri Lanka protects the elephants now and they roam free throughout the country. The tiny baby in the picture below is 1-2 weeks old.
These pictures are a view from a lookout point in the national park where our safari took place. Gorgeous countryside.
After our elephant safari we returned to our hotel for a buffet dinner (we ate buffet for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the entire trip. I was glad my pants still fit me for the flight back to Germany)!
The next day we were again picked up at 8am and we went to climb Sigiriya, or "lion rock", which is 200 meters high and between 600-700 stairs. King Kasyapa (477 – 495 CE) built his palace on the top of this rock structure and built an enormous gateway in the form of a lion about halfway up the rock. Today the lion is gone and all that remains are the feet - which are enormous! The original lion must have been really impressive. This is also a UNESCO site. Also below, some monkeys hanging out at the start of the hike. Monkeys are everywhere in Sri Lanka.
Some views from the top: Martin talking with our guide, Rohan, amongst the old palace ruins; a view of surrounding countryside; Rohan starting the climb back down. This hike is not for anybody who is afraid of heights!!
After our hike, we went on a "village tour". This was just a way for tourists to experience all the different forms of transportation in Sri Lanka - boat, tuk tuk, elephant, and ox-drawn cart. We declined the elephant riding because a) it's expensive, and b) I don't approve of keeping elephants chained up and used for tourist rides. I would have declined the ox-drawn cart as well but I didn't know it was part of the tour until it happened. We got out of the cart early anyway - Martin because it was an extremely rough ride and me because seeing the oxen pulling the cart being kicked and hit made me sad. I realize this is how things have been done for years in Sri Lanka but it doesn't mean I have to perpetuate it. Below are pictures from our boat ride with my water lily necklace, and our tuk tuk.
That night in our hotel we tried Arrack, the Sri Lankan national schnapps, made from coconuts. It didn't have much flavor. I didn't like it, but I've never liked any schnapps so this was no surprise.
The next day we got up and visited the cave temples, also known as the Rock Temple or the Golden Temple. It's known as the Golden Temple because of the enormous gold statue built in front of it. These temples were originally built in the 1st century CE and have been added to over the years. We climbed almost 400 steps to get to the 5 temples built into the rocks. In the temples are paintings and statues relating to Buddha and his life. This is also a UNESCO site.
Then we drove towards Kandy ...
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