Sri Lanka in Style

Dotted with ancient temples, the rural region of Kotugoda sits almost midway between the fishing town of Negombo, home to Sri Lanka’s international airport, and the bustling capital Colombo. The former is a lively beach resort with a Dutch fort, fish market and mangrove-fringed lagoons; in the latter, Sri Lanka’s colonial past jostles up against shiny new high-rises, chic shops.  

The Cultural Triangle – encompassing the ancient cities of Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa and Kandy, and everything in between – is a hinterland of history at Sri Lanka’s very heart. The grand vestiges of Anuradhapura, the seat of power in Sri Lanka for 1,300 years until it was abandoned in 993, have been reclaimed from the jungle: tour palaces, stupas and ancient reservoirs, as well as tumbledown temples still in use today. Back-to-nature activities in the wider region include bird watching, kayaking and cycling through local villages, offering an active counterpoint to the rich history of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

A lively tropical city set around a tranquil lake, Kandy is woven through with the sumptuous religious relics of an independent kingdom that thrived here between the 15th and early 19th centuries. The cultural heart of this metropolis, today enshrined as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the Sacred Temple of the Tooth, where votive Buddhist offerings take place to the rhythmical sound of drums and the heady scent of lotus.  

Sri Lanka is the fourth largest tea producer in the world, its undulating Central Highlands draped with verdant tea estates first formed under British rule in the 19th century. Pocket-sized villages such as  Dick oya  and Hatton are dotted among mist-shrouded, forest-covered hills, where activities include mountain biking along scenic tea trails, birdwatching walks and sampling different flavored brews on tea estate tours.  

Heading out on a safari in Yala, one of the country’s oldest and largest national parks, will yield far more than its headlining herds of elephants: wild peacocks, sloth bears and mongoose can be seen by the keen-eyed. It also has one of the highest leopard populations in the world, making game drives here among the most rewarding and exciting on the island.   

Each evening the UNESCO World Heritage city’s frangipani trees and romantic fortifications, which cradle the coast between Galle Fort Beach to Galle Lighthouse, are dramatically silhouetted against tangerine sunsets. What was once the country’s main trading post is now a honeypot for travelers who scoop up handcrafted lace, sip arrack in the bars and tuck into fragrant Sri Lankan dishes – or catch a game at the city’s international cricket stadium.