Sri Lanka 2026

We were woken by our 5.30 a.m alarm call and had boarded our bus by 6 a.m for the beginning of today's adventure. Ruwan told us the story of the two princes who both wanted to be king and how the younger prince fortified the rock and lived there for some 18 years.  Here's a link  to (a slightly different version) of the story, to the one we were told. Also that the fortress stands on a volcanic plug formed of gnise rock. Arriving at the base of the rock we walked past a defensive outer (muddy) moat and an inner moat (full of crocodiles back some 1500 years ago.)  The inner moat The water gardens We climbed up steps Past some Buddhist monk caves Through the boulder garden To the mid point where there were some great views A good spot for a photo One of the lion's paws and a view of the climb still to do An artists impression of the lion rock as it was Views from the top ...

We both had a sound night's sleep and were woken up at 6 a.m by the dawn chorus, lovely to lie in bed and listen to.  I thought that I would try milk with my cuppa at breakfast but it was UHT so It'll stick with black tea! Afterwards, luggage loaded, we boarded our bus and drove for about 2.5 hours to the cave temples. The roads between towns were very quiet. Each town was very busy with people and traffic, all the shops and businesses seemed to be along the main road. There were 5 cave temples with colourful well preserved paintings and Buddha statues which date back as far as the 1st century B.C First thing tomorrow (a 6am start) we are walking up the Sigiriya Rock Fortress. A fantastic view of the fortress from the hotel pool where we enjoyed a leisurely swim followed by a drink from the bar. While I was writing the blog, Neil went o...

Our overnight flight to Columbo, of 10 hours and 45 minutes, departed and arrived on time and we managed to nap on and off. The temperature on arrival was a very warm 33 degrees, with 80 percent humidity and very strong sunshine. We are pretty near the equator so day and night will be of near equal length. After imigration and collecting our suitcases we met our guide and half of our fellow travellers, the others had arrived on an earlier flight. Despite the war in the Middle East everyone has made it here. We boarded our small coach for the 30 minute drive north to our first hotel in Veyangoda. It's quite luxurious by Exodus standards! The view fom our room The pool at night Had a dip in the very warm pool and covered ourselves in Deet to hopefully fend off the mossies which apparently put in an appearance in the  late afternoon. We have a small lake outside our balcony and spotted some beautiful birds in the early evening, including a kingfishe...