Polonnaruwa

About Polonnaruwa

Sri Lanka's second great capital is its most enjoyable ruin: a compact UNESCO-listed royal city of palaces, monasteries and colossal carved Buddhas, laid out beside an ancient reservoir so vast the locals call it a sea - and best explored on two wheels.

When Anuradhapura fell in the 11th century, the kings moved south-east to Polonnaruwa and built a capital that, for two golden centuries, was among the great cities of Asia. What survives is remarkably legible: royal council chambers, seven-storey palace walls, moonstone-carved temples and monastic colleges, all threaded by shady paths through parkland patrolled by toque macaques.

The masterpiece is Gal Vihara - four Buddhas cut from a single granite ridge, including a 14-metre reclining figure whose serenity has survived eight centuries of monsoons. Close behind comes the Vatadage, a perfectly circular relic shrine whose guard stones and moonstones are the finest carving in the country.

Everything sits beside the Parakrama Samudra, the 12th-century 'Sea of Parakrama' - a 2,500-hectare reservoir built by the city's greatest king, whose creed was that not one drop of rain should reach the ocean unused. Sunset on its bund, with fishermen casting and elephants sometimes visible on the far shore, is the Cultural Triangle at its most peaceful. Because the site is flat and compact, the classic way to see it all is by bicycle.