Sigiriya alone is worth a trip to Sri Lanka.
Climb the amazing rock of Sigiriya with its impregnable palace fortress built in the fifth century and enjoy the magnificant views over the once magnificent royal pool, the throne, remains of the majestic palace, walk ways and garden.
Sigiriya is a sixth century fortress perched on a 200 metre high rock and one the most dramatic of Sri Lanka's historic sites. On the western and northern sides of the steep rock face runs a gallery or pathway which provides access to the seemingly inaccessible nearly three acre wide summit. Shielding this pathway is a 9½ft plaster wall so highly polished that even today after fifteen centuries of exposure to the sun and rain one can see one's reflection in it!
To the North is the Pidurangala Rock, where a Buddhist monastery and cave temples are found and near the summit one of the largest reclining Buddha statues made out of brick and mortar. The to South East is what remains of Sigiri Maha Weva, and in the South the Mapagala Rock, which was a fortress long before Sigitiya was built.
Don’t rush through all this magnificence. Be prepared to spend at least one whole day, walking around the Sigiriya gardens, the newly laid out herbal garden. Walk to the northern corner of the western moat and look to the south down the moat, and see how it had been made in line with the summit of a far away hill.
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