It's the last of our 4 days in Dambulla and we have really enjoyed it here. It's been full on but that was the plan. Get the sightseeing out of the way and then move onto the important stage of relaxation.
Today was a toss up between visiting Annahadupura or Pollurauwa. Both are about 65 km from Dambulla. After researching on the Interweb we plumped for the latter. Both are ancient city complexes daring back to the 11th century. As far as Crispy is concerned Both are "rubble".
I decided on Polĺuranawu as the ride there looked more interesting consisting of jungle, rice paddy and lakes. Plus it took us deep into elephant country where we might come across more of these amazing creatures for Dear old Crispy. I feel sufficiently comfortable with "Ruby" now that I am sure I could outrun or at least avoid them crushing us inside our little tin box.
Footnote :
When travelling through southern India some years ago I remember visiting a Palace near Agra where a guide told us about execution by elephant. It seems that petty criminals were brought before the maharaja for trial. If found guilty a specially trained elephant was brought forward to dispatch the unfortunate fellon by standing on his head.
I don't know what brought that to mind but it seemed apt.
As it turned out we saw no elephant on the roads today and although the ride was amazing and the scenery breathtaking it was uneventful. The were however thousands of monkey. We have never seen so many of the little furry feckers. They are everywhere. At least inside our tuk tuk we had no need to get up close and personal with them.
The other reason we wanted to visit Polluranuwa is that it was the home of the first temple to house the Buddha's tooth after it was brought from India in the 10th century. We will visit the current temple of the tooth in a few days time at Kandy. The tooth is a really important relic to Buddhists as it is the only relic of the guy himself. Some say the tooth was taken by the Portuguese in the 16th century to prevent a buddhist uprising and hasten the conversion of the Singhalese to catholicism but the Sri Lankans claim that they took the wrong one. It's very complicated. I shall say no more.
Suffice to say it was amazing. A huge sprawling site spread over 15 square kilometers. In our short time there we only saw the most important sites but it was really impressive and worth the drive.
Moggy says how appropriate that the ‘tooth’ is at Kandy !
ReplyDeleteI believe he was a tad partial to Haribo
DeleteLoving the tour
ReplyDelete