I had a road trip around Sri Lanka last month, and the first day was the trek from Colombo to Anuradhapura. I had the afternoon and evening at Anuradhapura, which is a world heritage site for the well-preserved ruins. Th city was founded around 437 B.C. but was inhabited for much longer and is considered one of the most longest inhabited cities in Asia and was once the capitol of the country. It serves as a Buddhist pilgrimage site and contains the ruins of monastaries and temples, though the temples are now maintained and recovered from nature. The guide I had told me that they were maintained in the later 1990s and early 2000s after years of neglect when they were covered in mounds of dirt when he was growing up.
The city was destroyed due to invaders from southern India. It was not populated for centuries until the British colonial area in the late 1800s, but it never recovered its original status. Today it is primarily a historical and pilgrimage site.
The first stop was to get a late lunch, and I had different dishes at a local Sri Lankan restaurant.
They also had a resident cat who was very pregnant or who had just had kittens.
I crossed through several towns and villages and admired the scenery.
We finally got to Anuradhapura, and below is the museum and information centre. We went into the museum at the end.
At the back of the museum is the entrance to the ruins and the temples.
We saw a land monitor, a type of giant lizard. There was a water one too, but I did not get a photo.
We went into the first temple, which had the statues of Buddha and a shrine.
We also went to another temple, but it did not have a shrine inside.
Around the temple were various grafitti carved into the walkway - inscriptions and game boards.
We then went by car to another location where there are pools. We were told that the monks would sit here.
We also saw some Buddha statues. There were four that would have been in this shrine area. Only one remains intact.
There were many wild monkeys everywhere.
We also went to a part of the former monastary.
One temple had a well-preserved moonstone. This is the entrance to the temple that is meant to help you think good thoughts when entering.
Carved figures also are marking the entrance.
There were also monks visiting.
Below was irrigation and water set up. It was an advanced community.
The reservoir was also built to supply water.
After we finished, we had a quick look around the museum.
I headed to the hotel for a quick break and we planned to meet in the evening to go back to the site and to see the new temple pilgrimage site.
The temple was busy.
As we left to go back to the hotel, we had a nice viewpoint over the temples from the other side of the lake.
I was impressed at the ruins and the infrastructure for such an ancient site with many ruins well-preserved. I enjoyed visiting the temple in the evening as well.
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