The Beach Tour - Sri Lanka 2013 - Ancient Ruins, Long Bike Ride and Finish Line!

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Anuradhapura, as I mentioned in my previous post, Is Sri Lanka's oldest capital, and the birthplace of Buddhism in Sri Lanka. The old city, which is quite impressive in size, contains one of South Asia's best collections of archaeological and architectural wonders. The massive site, a UNESCO Heritage site - spans several square kilometres, and contains crumbling ruins of Temples, huge dagobas, tall brick towers, ancient pools/ponds, statues and stone carvings dating back 2000+ years.

The city itself was named capital way back in 340 BC… Yes it has been that long… In the years 247-207 BC, Buddhism gained traction on the island, and Anuradhapura became a great, glamourous city. The city fell several times to invaders, but held onto its importance for about 500 years, when it was finally replaced by Polonnaruwa in the East.

The site was so large and so impressive, it was difficult to know even where to begin. The ruins literally show a lost city… You could almost imagine what it looked like 2000 years ago. We started with the Sri Maha Bodhi, or the sacred Bodhi Tree. The Tree is symbolic of the birth of Buddhism in Sri Lanka. The tree started as a cutting brought from Bodhgaya, India by the Princess Sangamitta, whose sister, Mahinda introduced Buddha's teachings. The Sacred Tree is the oldest, historical authenticated tree in the world. It has been tended to continuously by appointed guardians for well over 2000 years. It was pretty cool.

The other highlight was The Jetavanarama Dagoba. It was built in the 3rd Century and when it was built, it was the third tallest monument in the world - the first 2 being the Egyptian Pyramids. Lonely Planet says that there is a British guidebook from the early 1900's that calculated that there were enough bricks in the Dagoba's brick core, to make a 3m high wall stretching from London to Edinburgh!!!! Now THAT's a lot of bricks!

WE spent nearly half a day exploring the Ancient ruins of Anuradhapura - fortunately we had our bikes, unfortunately, it decided to rain… It is the first time this trip that we have been stick in the rain - so I guess those are still pretty good odds 😊 It did make for a very wet ride home that is for sure… But again, it is so warm you really don't notice afar a while.

The one thing that I will mention, and those of you that do plan on travelling to Sri Lanka, is that you are required to remove your shoes when entering any of the Holy sites, which is pretty much everywhere! I should NOT have had a pedicure before I left… my poor delicate feet took quite a beating! you would think they would pave/tile whatever - but no - you had to walk through sand, rocks, etc… very painful! I need to better understand the reasoning around the removal of footwear lol!

The guesthouse we stayed in was very comfortable and we met this very cute couple from Australia who we chatted with for quite some time at dinners… really cool actually - she is originally from Germany, he from New Zealand, they met in Australia, now they both quit their jobs and are taking a few months to travel before looking for work back in Germany!

So from Anuradhapura, we have about 175km to cover off over 2 days… There is one town in between at about 75km that will have accommodations, and another at 130km… So we left it open to see what kind of day were were having on the bikes, plus I still wasn't 100% so wanted to be cautious! We blew out of the gate at 5:30 am, and had 75km done by 9:30 am and that was with a 30 min break! So when we got to Puttalam, we decided to push to Chilaw at 130km. We had a tail wind and we flew into Chilaw before 1pm… 130km before 1pm, with breaks is probably as amazing as it gets when you are doing these types of tours… the bags definitely slow you down, so an average speed above 20kmh is impressive! Pushing to Chilaw also means that we only have about 40km to go to get to Negombo - that is our finish line and also where the airport is located. We arrived early into Negombo, around 9am and got settled into our guesthouse before having breakfast and checking out the shops and the beach!

Negombo, actually most of the towns between Puttalam and Negombo are predominately Roman Catholic… It was interesting as we saw very little evidence of Christianity until we reached Chilaw… We've seen loads of Buddhist temples, tons of Mosques (Although these are very hard to miss with the call to prayer 5 times a day), and even a handful of Hindi temples. We actually saw a magnificent Hindi temple just south of Chilaw… got lots of great pictures of that one.. was very neat as I don't think I have actually seen one that close before. Vey colourful! But here in Negombo and further north - LOADS of Catholic Churches, likely built during the time of the Portuguese and Dutch (Which also explains whey there is not a lot inland)..

Negombo is situated about 30Km North of Colombo, and I would describe it as a laid back beach town. Most tourists, given it's proximity to the airport, either start and/or end their journey here rather than in Colombo. There is a pretty little strip of bars, shops, restaurants, hotels and guesthouses just off the beach… The beach isn't great compared to what we have experienced along the southern coast, however it is still very pretty, and it is a beach 😊

So here is where we end our trip.. the next few days will just be for some shopping, relaxing on the beach and getting ready for our 30hour journey home… I am certainly not looking forward to coming back to temps in the -20's and heaps of snow, however the Christmas Season is upon us and the fun will make up for the weather - hopefully 😊

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