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Destinations

Every place we cover, with the season, the stay length and the journey times you need to put them in a sensible order.

21 destinations

Region

Interest

Matching destinations

  • West Coast

    Colombo

    The island's loud, layered, rapidly changing front door

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 1 night

  • West Coast

    Negombo

    Twenty minutes from the airport, and a beach at the end of it

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 1 night

  • Cultural Triangle

    Sigiriya

    A fifth-century sky palace on a two-hundred-metre rock

    • Best May–Sep
    • 2 nights

  • Cultural Triangle

    Dambulla

    Five caves, one hundred and fifty Buddhas, two thousand years

    • Best May–Sep
    • 1 night

  • Cultural Triangle

    Polonnaruwa

    A medieval capital you can cycle around in a morning

    • Best May–Sep
    • 1 night

  • Cultural Triangle

    Anuradhapura

    A living sacred city, 1,400 years in the making

    • Best May–Sep
    • 1 night

  • Hill Country

    Kandy

    The last kingdom, around a lake, in the hills

    • Best Jan–Apr
    • 2 nights

  • Hill Country

    Nuwara Eliya

    Tea, mist and a half-remembered English winter

    • Best Jan–Apr
    • 2 nights

  • Hill Country

    Ella

    A gap in the mountains with the whole south below it

    • Best Feb–Apr & Jul–Sep
    • 2 nights

  • Hill Country

    Horton Plains

    Cloud forest, frost hollows, and a 900-metre drop

    • Best Jan–Mar
    • 1 night

  • Hill Country

    Adam's Peak (Sri Pada)

    Five thousand steps, in the dark, with thousands of pilgrims

    • Best Jan–Apr
    • 1 night

  • South Coast

    Galle

    A Dutch fort on a headland, still lived in

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 2 nights

  • South Coast

    Unawatuna

    A curved bay twenty minutes from the fort

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 2 nights

  • South Coast

    Mirissa

    Blue whales offshore, palm trees leaning over the sand

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 2 nights

  • South Coast

    Hikkaduwa

    Coral, turtles and the island's oldest surf town

    • Best Dec–Mar
    • 2 nights

  • Wilderness & National Parks

    Yala National Park

    The best chance of a leopard anywhere on earth

    • Best Feb–Jul
    • 2 nights

  • Wilderness & National Parks

    Wilpattu National Park

    The biggest park, the fewest jeeps, the land of lakes

    • Best Feb–Jul
    • 1 night

  • East Coast

    Arugam Bay

    One of Asia's great right-hand point breaks

    • Best May–Sep
    • 3 nights

  • East Coast

    Trincomalee

    One of the world's great natural harbours, and the calmest water on the island

    • Best May–Aug
    • 2 nights

  • North

    Jaffna

    Palmyra, kovils and a cuisine of its own

    • Best Feb–Apr & Jul–Sep
    • 2 nights

Where to go

Explore by region

Sri Lanka is small but it is not uniform. The monsoons run in opposite directions, so the right coast in July is the wrong coast in January.