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Published: December 27th 2008
The Ancient Cities An early 6am start to my day and my driver Anish was ready and excited about the 2 day trip that he had planned for me. A few days before l had approached a few taxi drivers that operate around the hotel area, with a list of places that l wanted the see whilst in Sri Lanka. After being quoted some of the funniest prices for this trip, l spotted Anish who had taken me a few times into town. I give him the list and his quote, with a hotel room for the night including evening meal and breakfast was still expensive compared to India but in the previous week l had learnt that Sri Lanka is not India and nor are there prices.
Our first stop after a 3 hour drive through beautiful countryside with paddy fields, Mango, Pineapple, Coconut, Avocado, Cashew Nuts, Tea & Soursap (I’ll come to Soursap that later) plantations, was the town of Dambulla. North of the Hill Country, in one of the driest parts of the country, lies the original heart of Sri Lanka civilisation. During the golden age of Sinhalase civilisation, it was called Rajarta -
At the Top of the Long Climb Up
This is what l first saw after the long climb up, so glad there was more to see than just thisThe land of Kings. For 1500 years of dynasties war, invasions and religious missions to Asia, increasing ambitious dams and irrigation systems supported two great cities - Anurdhapura and Polonaruwa - and many magnificent examples of the regions Buddhist culture. For almost a thousand years the jungle did its best to reclaim them, but major archaeological excavations over the past century have partially restored their glory.
Dambulla Cave Temples. The Cave temples sit 100m to 150m above the road in the southern part of Dambulla. When we pulled into the carpark, the first view is the Golden Temple built in 2000 from donations from Japan. The Giant 30m high Buddha (Dhammachakka Mudra ) sits on top the Temple. But this is not the main attraction so l made my way left of the temple to some stairs, so l start to climb, and climb and climb after about 45 minutes of climbing and by now a soaking wet T-shirt and trousers l reached a small white building. The first thing l thought was “If I’ve spent 45 minutes climbing for this, l want my money back”. As l got nearer to the White building signs told
us to remove our shoes and hats. I shouldn’t have worried as this was only the ticket kiosk. Once through l saw a long line of white buildings built into the face of the mountain rock. The caves history as a place of worship is thought to date back to the 1st century BC, when King Valagamba, driven out of Anuradhapura, took refuge here. When he regained his throne he had the interior of the caves carved into magnificent rock temples. Further improvements were made by later Kings, including King Nissanka Malla, who had the caves interiors gilded, earning the name Ran Giri (Golden Rock).There are five separate caves containing about 150 Buddha images. Most of the paintings in the temple date from the 19th century.
Cave I (Devaraja Viharaya) The first cave, the Temple of the King of Gods, has a 15m-long reclining Buddha, Ananda, the Buddha’s loyal disciple, and other seated Buddhas are depicted nearby. Seeing this for the first time was quiet an overpowering experience as the sheer size and brightest of the Buddha was a image l had seen in a couple of books since arriving in Sri Lanka, the pictures l
have taken really do not give it justice, nor any of the other statues within these caves. The detail and colours, including some of the gold gild, even though some of the gold has since disappeared was incredible.
Cave II (Maharaja Viharaya) The Temple of the Great King is arguably the most spectacular of the caves. It measures 52m from east to west, and 23m from the entrance to the back. The highest point of the ceiling is 7m. The cave is named after tow statues of the Kings it contains. There is a painted wooden statue of Valagamba on the left of the entrance and another statue of Nissanka Malla. There is a vessel inside the cave that collects water that constantly drips from the ceiling of the temple - even during droughts - which is used for sacred rituals.
Cave III (Maha Alut Viharaya) This cave, the New Great Temple, was said to have been converted from a storeroom in the 18th century by the King Kirti Sri Rajasinghe of Kandy, one of the ladst of the Kandyan Monarchs. This cave too, is filled with Buddha statues, including the beautiful
reclining Buddha, and is separated from cave II by only a masonry wall.
Cave IV (Pachima Viharaya) The small western cave is not the most westerly cave - position ids given to Cave V. The central Buddha figure is seated under a makara torano, with its hands in dhyana mudra (a meditative pose in which the hands are cuped). The small dagoba in the centre was broken by thieves who believed that it contained jewellery belonging to Queen Somawaithie.
Cave V (Devana Alut Viharaya) This cave is said to be only about 100 years old and was once a store-house, but is now called the Second New Temple. It features a reclining Buddha. Hindus including Kataragama and Vishnu are also present inside this temple.
I spent a good couple of hours walking around these 5 temples and was lucky enough to be standing next to a group of German Tourist that had hired on e of the guides here, he was speaking in English and a woman was then translating into German. Outside these caves was just as impressive and a beautiful water-Lily pond gave a sense of peace and tranquillity
to the whole morning.
But as you all know, if you walk up you normally have to walk back down again. So l started the journey back to the car park to meet my driver and stopped to take a few pictures of a Monkey sitting in one of the trees. After a couple of snaps he jumped forwards and through the camera lens l just spotted him and jumped out of the way. A few minutes later l stopped to drink some water and a guy was giving an ice-cream vender a cigarette, there was then an almighty scream. I turned round to see that a mad looking Monkey had taken this opportunity whilst the vendor was not looking to nick most of the ice-cream cornets. The vendor was then chasing the Monkey around the walkways with a broom.
Twenty minutes later l was back on ground level and spent a few minutes taken some more pictures of the Golden Buddha. Although impressive l declined the offer to look in the Buddhist Museum as there are only replicas of statues and pictures, l will save a visit to a Buddhist Museum for when l am in Thailand.
Our next stop was to check into the Hotel that Anish had booked for me and was pleasantly surprised with his choice, we even had a outdoor swimming pool and l even had A/C. After a change of T-Shirt we made our way to Sigiriya about 25km from the Hotel.
Why does anything worth seeing, always involve loads of bloody steps!
Originally called Sihagiri (Remembrance Rock) and later dubbed Sigiriya (Lion Rock), the rock mass is actually the hardened magma plug of an extinct volcano that long ago eroded away. Pocked with natural cave shelters and rock overhangs - the rock may have been inhabited in prehistoric times. Popular myth says that the formation served royal and military functions during the reign of King Kassapa (AD 477-495), who allegedly built a garden and palace on the summit. According to this theory, King Kassapa sought out an unassailable new residence after overthrowing and murdering his own father, King Dhatusena of Anuradhapura.
To get to the rock and its summit you enter into a vast area with gardens, large pools and yes you guessed it more stairs. This area was vast and there was plenty to see, although all
the buildings have since disappeared their foundation and some of the walls remain.
Royal Gardens The landscaped gardens around Sigiriya consist of water gardens, boulder gardens and terrace gardens. The beautiful symmetrical water gardens which extend from the western foot of the rock, bathing pools, little islands with pavilions that were used as dry-season palaces and trees frame the approach to the rock. The rock rises sheer and mysterious from the jungle. A series of steps leads up through the boulders as its base to the western face, and then ascends it quiet steeply. Yet again within about ten minutes of climbing my T-Shirt was completely soaking and gasping for air, am l really that unfit?
Frescoes About halfway up the rock there is a modern spiral stairway (Yep more bloody stairs) that leads up from the main route to a long, sheltered gallery in the sheer of the rock. In this niche is a series of paintings of buxom, wasp-waisted woman, popularly believed to represent either apsaras (celestial nymphs) or King Kassapa’s concubines. No one knows the exact date of the impressive paintings, but there is also an argument that these
painting actually are a form of Tantric Buddhism and not from the reign of the King.
The walkway to view these beautiful paintings is very tight and with about 20 people at the time all trying to take pictures, l was approached by one of the army guards stationed on this platform to follow him, “In trouble again” “but l didn’t touch anything, yet” were the thoughts going through my head, when he lead me into a cornered of part of the gallery and there in front of me was about 10 of these portraits that the rest of the public couldn’t see. Although there may have been as many as 500 portraits at one time, only 22 remain today - several were badly damaged by a vandal in 1967. Today security is very tight on the approach to this section of the rock, they are also protected from the sun in the sheltered gallery, and the paintings remain in remarkable condition, their colours still glowing.
Mirror Wall Down, this time yep more stairs from the fresco gallery and a path clings to the sheer side of the rock and is protected on the outside
by a 3m high wall. This wall was coated with smooth glaze upon which visitors of 1000 years ago felt impelled to note their impressions of the woman in the gallery - or so says local legend. The graffiti were inscribed between 6th and 14th century, and 685 of them have been deciphered and published in a two-volume edition, Sigiri Graffiti. The graffiti are of great interest to scholars (that counts me our straight away) because they show the development of the Sinhala language and script, and because they demonstrate this in its art and beauty. One of the graffiti reads “The ladies who wear golden chains on their breasts beckon me”. Once you leave the Mirror Wall you are then faced with another challenge, this time even though its more steps, this time the foot holes are very small if not missing and even though there is a hand rail to assist you to the next level it was quiet an effort and in some place even for me quiet frightening. So to all the guys and girls that l have met in the last few months, and have seen in your faces the fear that heights and climbing
has shown, l know exactly what you went through.
Lion’s Paws Once l reached this next level and downed at least two bottles of tepid warm water from my bag it was time (Ok and about 4 cigarette to catch my breath) to climb to the final summit. Either side of the first set of steps are giant Lion Paws. At one time there was a gigantic brick Lion sat at this end of the rock and the final accent to the top commenced with a stairway that led between the Lion’s Paws and into his mouth. The Lion symbolism serves as a reminder to devotees ascending the rock that Buddha was Sakya-Simha (Lion of the Sakya Clan) and that the truth that he spoke of, were as powerful as the sound of the lions roar.
The 5th century Lion has since disappeared, apart from the first steps and the paws. Reaching the summit means clambering up across a series of grooves cut into the rock, fortunately there is a handrail. Mind you that’s great until, some idiot decides to come down the same way about 50 people are climbing up. Bring with them their
whole family, so now about 70 people are trying to move in-between the side of the rock and a small handrail, with about a 200m drop looking straight at me. But finally l reached the top and boy what a view it is.
Summit The top of the rock covers 1.6 hectares. At one time it was covered with buildings (How did they get all the bricks up there?), but today is only the foundations. The design of the so called palace, and all the magnificent views it commands, suggests that Sigiriya was more a place of residence than a fortress. A 27m-by-21m pond hewn out of the rock looks more like a swimming pool, but would have been used merely for the storage of water. I found are quiet area near the edge and sat for about an hour just looking out at this amazing view, and also to get some more energy back into my now hot, sweaty and aching legs, because when you climb up you have to climb down again!
Bright eyed and bushing tailed, well nearly let me have breakfast first Not such an early start to
our second day of visiting this fantastic part of the countryside. Morning started with fresh watermelon juice, and a plate of prepared Pineapple, Mango, Papaya and Watermelon. Ok most of you that know me, know that l don’t eat fruit, but seeing all the plantations during our drive the day before l though l should show willing. Watermelon juice drunk, pineapple, papayas, mango soon followed suit, the only thing l didn’t try was the watermelon. This was then finished off with freshly brewed coffee and toast and marmalade (Yum, Yum, and Yum). Anish then turned up and packed my bags back into the car and we were off once again, this time towards Mihintale, another Buddhist area.
Mihintale We arrive after a few detours as there are a few areas where the Police have closed roads so that the bulk of the traffic takes the same route and they can then do routine car and document checks. As soon as they saw a white face sitting in the passenger’s seat they hurried Anish on without us having to stop. “It’s great having Foreigners” Anish said with a great big smile.
Mihintale is of enormous significance to
the Sinhalese because it is where Buddhism originated in Sri Lanka. In 247 BC, King Devanampiya Tissa of Auradhapura met Mahinda, son of the great Indian Buddhist emperor Ashoka, while deer hunting around the hills at Minhintale, and was converted to Buddhism.
And if l though the steps were tough the day before l was in for a surprise today. In a series of flights, 1840 ancient granite slabs steps lead majestically up the hillside. The first step is the widest and shallow, higher the step the narrower and steeper, great just what l needed more bloody steps and my legs had still not got over the from the day before. But as the title of this blog says “There’s Natural Beauty and then there’s Man Made Beauty, but sometimes you get both at the same time”, and this was most certainly one of them. Even before l had climbed 3 of the main attractions within this area l fell hook, line and sinker for this magical piece of paradise in the midst of the jungle.
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angela king
non-member comment
merry christmas Geoff, it looks like your christmas is more of an adventure than one in old blighty.I cannot believe that you have been away for five months the time must be flying for you. Enjoy your new year