16 April 2013

Sigiriya is a rock fortress and city located in the Matale District and is right in the middle of the cultural triangle formed by Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa and Kandy (the last kingdom).  It stands 200m high and the whole complex was built in seven years by King Kasyapa (477 – 495 AD).  After the death of Kasyapa, it was a monastery complex up to the 14th century.  After this, it was abandoned until the discovery of the ruins in 1907 by British Explorer, John Still.

We got up early to get to the Sigiriya rock. We arrived at the site at 6:30am. The gates opened at 7am. We looked around the area and viewed the beauty of the rock in the morning sun. The rock had about 1055 steps to the top. It was declared a world heritage site in 1982. UNESCO had been sponsoring some restoration work.

Inscriptions in the caves suggest that the rock was used as a religious place from the 3rd century BC. As you are proceeding towards the rock itself, you will observe structures built on either side of the walkway in a symmetrical fashion. The summer palace of the king was at ground level and the winter palace was on top of the rock.

After we pass the outer and inner moat (the latter used to have a drawbridge at the entry) we are welcomed into the water garden. The pond on one side has been restored but the pond on the left side is still underground, awaiting restoration. This then leads through the fountain garden, which contained narrow rectangular ponds (see above).  There are four fountains, two on either side.  The limestone slab (see below), has large holes in the limestone slab.

The whole system of water features is driven by water sourced from the top of the rock and passed down to the ground level by a system of channels. The fountain itself is run by only water pressure within these channels. During the rainy season, our guide tells us that there is enough water pressure within these channels to make these fountains function, even today! This system truly displays the engineering brilliance of the ancient Sri Lankans

After the fountain garden, the path takes us past the summer palace. Nothing stands today except for the foundation stones around the perimeter. The ancient buildings for the summer palace would have been made of wood.

Then we proceeded up a few steps and through the first of two boulder archway that is formed by two rocks resting on each other.

The steps that lead up to the top are made of marble. The idea behind this is that at night the marble will glow under the moonlight and thus provides natural illumination.

Just on one side of the rock archway is a very faint outline of a fresco that had been almost erased by the weather.

There were more steps that lead us to the rock face. On the right hand side just before the rock face is the Audience Hall.

The picture below shows the ascent from the Audience Hall level.

At the rock face, a series of metal staircases that are attached to the rock lead us up to the ancient walkways along the rock face. The original ancient system of staircases here have collapsed over time.

The walkway along the face of the rock lead us to spiral metal staircase which we climbed to enter a cave that had well preserved frescoes. No flash photography was allowed here to preserve these surviving ancient frescoes.An Apsara or a Sigiriya damsel with her associate (above).

An Apsara and her associate to the left (above).  A second Apsara is below.

The artist in those days sometimes made mistakes. The woman on the right has only four fingers in one hand. The women painted on these walls are of various descent. Some are Indian, some are African and some are Arab. It showed that Sri Lanka was visited by people from various lands. The frescoes were painted by a mixture of sand, beeswax, honey, natural plant dye to name a few constituents that I could remember.

Then we proceeded to along a walkway that gave us a good view of the summer place area below.

The walkway on one side had a wall. In ancient times it was known as Kedapath Pavura or the Sigiriya Mirror Wall. This is because the wall was made of brick masonry and has a polished plaster finish. The wall reflected the frescoes painted on the rock face. Thus anybody walking along this walkway had images on either side to view.  There are some ancient graffiti written on this wall.

Going further along the walkway, we went up a set of restored stairs to the next level. To the left of us was what was once the guard house where soldiers overlooked the area below for approaching enemies.

At the far end of the guard house, there is a huge boulder resting on some short rock columns. The boulder is a rock missile that is used to launch towards approaching enemy soldiers. Obviously it is a use once system with no reload mechanism!

Further along a walkway and up some more stairs, we come to a flat area with an entrance way that opens between two lion’s paws that have been carved out of rock. It originally is thought to have had a lion’s head with the lion’s mouth (a recumbent pose) being the entrance way to the next level. This structure is believed to have collapsed over time.

Through the lion’s paws and up a set of steel steps built into the rock, we were nearing the top.  The view on the way up here is quite spectacular.  We could see the route we had taken below.

Coming up to this stage, Charles was getting tired and his legs were seizing up.  We had frequent breaks and fortunately, Charles brought his personal masseur on this trip.

We climbed further on a combination of original marble stairs and steel staircases which lead us to a flat pathway.

A few short steps later, we were at the top.

The two limestone slabs represent the highest point on Sigiriya Rock.  In ancient times, this flat area had the two level winter palace.  The limestone slabs mark the spot where the stairs led to the 2nd level of the winter palace.

We conquered Sigiriya Rock!  Looking at the top of this rock platform from various angles truly brought out the serenity of this place.

The way back down was just as interesting as the way up. There was an ancient pond made out of brick at the top (below).  I guess that rainwater was collected here and water channels fed water to the levels below including the fountains.

While on the way down but still at the top area, we came a across a flat terrace with a huge flat limestone slab in one corner (below).  The king sat here while watching about 500 damsels dance and entertain him on the terrace in front.  The square holes in the ground would have contained wooden posts that supported a canopy that provided shade for the king.

The performance area is reasonably large and would have been decorated in full colour.

Going further on the way down, we come across the Audience Hall which we passed on the way up.  This is where the king received his subjects.  The surface is a flattened out rock with a stone seat that has been carved out of a rock boulder.  This place again had holes in the rock that had wooden posts to support some sort of canopy.

To the side other side of the Audience Hall, in the rock face itself, is a cave with a drip ledge that was used by Buddhist monks for meditation in ancient times.  It was carved out of rock.  During the king’s rein, he took respite here from sessions he had at the Audience Hall.  The cave provided a natural shelter.  There is a stone seat for the king in this cave.  The layers of painting and a few graffiti in this cave dates back to 8 – 9 century AD.

We proceed past this cave and through the 2nd boulder archway.

The path then leads us past the Cobra Head Cave, known because the natural shape resembles a cobra head.  The cave had been used by Buddhist monks between the 3rd and 1st century BC.

We made our way back to our car and back to the hotel.  We cleaned up, packed our bags to make a short trip to Dambulla.

Dambulla has 5 cave temples that had been cut out of an enormous granite outcrop that rises to about 160m.  The path to the temple is quite scenic.  The cave temples date back to about 100 BC.

It was a hot day.  The monkeys along the path to the caves were having (a well earned) afternoon snooze.

We reached the temple entrance after about a 30 min walk.  I donned my sarong (shorts above knee high not acceptable dress code).  To the right of us was the first cave.  Next door to it is a small chapel dedicated to Kataragama (Hindu Murugan).

We went through all the caves.  These are places of worship and I made it a point not to use flash photography.

The entrance ways to the caves look like they were built in the 1920s or so.

There is a bell tower near the entrance.

After Dambulla, we had a longer trip of about 4 hours to Nallataniya (aka Delhousie).  This is the gateway town to Adam’s Peak, which we were going to attempt during the night.  On the way to Nallataniya, we passed by Matale, the childhood town of Vijaya who was with us in Jaffna.  I promised to take some photos of the town for her.

Nallataniya town was packed.  There were thousands of people around and the shops were brightly lit.  These people were mostly pilgrims, who were about to do their New Year’s pilgrimage up to the peak, which has a Buddhist and Hindu temple.

We checked ourselves into the Punsisi Rest House.  Although the room was smallish, it was comfortable.  The staff were polite, friendly and helpful.  We had a quick dinner at the restaurant here before turning in for a short sleep.  One of the staff members recommended that we start our climb at 12:30 am instead of our original intention of 1:30 am.  He advised that since there were a lot of people going to climb to the peak, it is best to start earlier.  Charles was feeling a bit weary from today.  He had earlier said that he might not attempt Adam’s Peak, with it’s over 5000 steps to the peak.  But in the evening he decided to go part of the way.  With that, we turned in for a good, short rest of about 4 hours!