I wondered down after breakfast to meet with Bob to arrange him to tuk tuk us to Sigiriya – I also took the opportunity to pick up some supplies. Not cheap!! We chilled around the pool until midday after which Bob took us to Sigiriya (about 11km) via an ATM and a local tourist store to buy a pipe – got one that Sherlock would have been proud of.
Took as a while to find our accomodation – Cloudz Sigiriya – as it was out in the middle of nowhere. The place is nice – just needs some more money to bring it up to excellent. Paying was a bit of a problem as they didn’t accept cards and so had to TT the money using a very average internet. We then arranged to hire 3 scooters for the 4 days ($14 per scooter per day) as we needed transport to get in and of Sigiria and to visit the Lion Rock and Pidurangal Rock. Conor and Amanda arrived around 2 so Conor and I grabbed a lift with the ‘resort’s’ owner and went and picked up the scooters. The scooters were empty so before heading home we had to fill them up with petrol – mine ran out just before the station but I managed to bunny hop the last 1km. Filling both scooters cost $18.
We headed home and picked up Amanda and Deryn and headed back onto Sigiriya for lunch / early dinner. The food was quite different to that previously eastern – the noodles had a dollop of tomato sauce on the side? After eating we headed over to Pidurangal Rock for the climb to the summit. A bus arrived as we arrived so we made a quick beeline for the steps to the summit in the hope of avoiding the crowds. The going was challenging but OK until we got about 100m from the summit at which point everyone had stopped. It was a choke point between those wanting to get up and those that wanted to get down – both groups had to funnel through a narrow gap in the rocks. After a few minutes and no movement I got sick of it and basically barged my way through having to do a few rock climbs; whereas after 10 minutes Conor shimmied up a gap between 2 rock and received applause when he made it to the top. The girls arrived 10 minutes later.
It was certainly worth the effort as the summit was huge with magnificent views – including of Lion Rock in the distance. Getting down was challenging again but less so than on the way up. Getting home was also a bit of a challenge as by now it was dark and we ended up driving long a very narrow and bumpy dirt road before finally making it back to our accommodation.
We had a very average breakfast at the hotel – an awful fish curry, mango honey mix and diced onions and tomatoes soaked in lemon juice. All topped off with a fried egg and loads of coffee. We then spent the morning waiting for Taylor to arrive. Poor thing had had a torrid time since arriving in SL. Firstly there was a mix up in taxis to pick her up from the airport and she ended up paying for 2 cars. Then the hotel had no air-conditioning and her driver to Sigiriya got lost and they ended taking an hour longer to get here after travelling a long way on dirt roads. The ultimate insult was having to wait 30 mins for her room to get ready in a hotel that only has 3 rooms in use and about 6 or 7 staff milling around. You think they would have had the room ready knowing that she was expected at 1.
Anyway she dumped her bag, got changed and then we all headed into Sigiriya for lunch – Taylor’s scooter had been dropped off earlier. I paid one of the staff $1 to go fill it up – seems the practice here is to return the scooter on empty. We found a chilled restaurant and spend a lovely couple of hours chilling over some curry and beers. The kids then headed into Dambulla to visit the Cave Temple while Dits and I spent a couple more hours using the restaurant Wifi to do some organising. Dits thought it was going to cost us $400 to get a van to drive to Ella (unfortunately the train is fully booked) but we managed to negotiate with a company we found in town to take us for $150 including a 1 hour stop in Kandy on the way.
We headed home around 6. The kids turned up around 730pm after being forced into a detour because of some wild elephants on the road. The next morning we were up at 630 to head into town early to climb Lion Rock. While dawn is meant to be perfect, the hotel concierge told us it would be very busy because of all the locals attending on a Sunday.
According to the ancient Sri Lankan chronicle, the local area was a large forest, then after storms and landslides it became a hill and was selected by King Kashyapa (AD 477–495) for his new capital. He built his palace on top of this rock and decorated its sides with colourful frescoes. On a small plateau about halfway up the side of this rock he built a gateway in the form of an enormous lion. The name of this place is derived from this structure; Siṃhagiri, the Lion Rock. The capital and the royal palace were abandoned after the king’s death. It was used as a Buddhist monastery until the 14th century. Sigiriya today is a UNESCO listed World Heritage Site. It is one of the best preserved examples of ancient urban planning.
It was pretty busy when we arrived at Lion Rock but after purchasing our tickets (USD35 each!) we joined the troops making the journey to the summit. Thankfully there were quite a few 2-way sections which meant the crowds were not too much of a problem. It took about 30 sweaty minutes (certainly cooled a bit by the occasional wind gusts) to reach the summit. It reminded Dits and me of a slightly less impressive Machu Picchu. We spent about 20 minutes on the summit before Taylor’s stomach insisted that we head into town a find a restaurant for breakfast.
We found a lovely restaurant on the main roads back to Cloudz that served western food and had an espresso machine. 6 omelettes and 8 coffees later we headed back to our hotel for some R&R by the pool.
We were picked up at 610am for our elephant safari in the Minneriya National Park. When we stopped to fill up with petrol, our guide asked if we had the 62k rupees for the park entrance fee. Deryn said it wasn’t necessary as we had paid it as part of our tour ticket. So off we drove. After a bit more investigation we discovered that we in fact had not paid the park entrance fee. Thankfully Amanda had a chunk of change plus the guide chipped in 12k which was enough to get us over the line.
While we only saw elephants over the 2 hours; we got to see a lot and some of them really up close. There was a bit of debate whether the A$100 per head was value for money but Deryn pointed out it was putting valuable money back into the local economy. The rest of the day was spent as per usual – eating in Sigiriya and relaxing around the pool at Cloudz.
There was a bit of drama going on in the background as it was taking a while for the funds I transferred using OzForex to get into the hotel owner’s account. He could not understand that it wasn’t coming from my account directly but via OzForex (when we checked in they could not accept credit cards – cash only – and we did not have enough cash so he suggested TT). He wasn’t going to let us leave until the money cleared until the local hotel manager (Leel) agreed to act as guarantor. What a lovely man.
There was a bit of drama going on in the background as it was taking a while for the funds I transferred using OzForex to get into the hotel owner’s account. He could not understand that it wasn’t coming from my account directly but via OzForex (when we checked in they could not accept credit cards – cash only – and we did not have enough cash so he suggested TT). He wasn’t going to let us leave until the money cleared until the local hotel manager (Leel) agreed to act as guarantor. What a lovely man.
