Cultural Triangle
10-Day Sri Lanka Cultural, Wildlife & Scenic Escape
Negombo / Sigiriya / Kandy / Nuwara Eliya / Ella / Tissamaharama / Galle
The shape
This is the island covered properly, and it moves. Nine nights across seven bases, with two doubled up - Sigiriya and Ella - so there are two mornings where nothing is packed.
Sigiriya at seven, before the coaches. The Tooth Relic during the midday ritual rather than around it. Tea country by road, then Ella on foot. Yala in the afternoon when the leopards move, and the last night inside the fort at Galle.
The route runs the length of the island - dry zone, hills, the south coast - so you leave having seen four different countries’ worth of landscape without ever driving more than three and a half hours in a day.
The Peacock Standard
Always included
- Private vehicle and chauffeur guide throughout
- Every property booked and confirmed
- Breakfast daily, dinner most nights
- Park and site entrances arranged in advance
- Airport meet-and-greet on arrival and departure
- Cold towels and chilled king coconut in the vehicle
- A number answered at any hour
What each day holds
Day by day
Day 1 · Negombo
A night to land
Met at the airport and driven twenty minutes up the coast. Nothing is scheduled. The point of this night is that day two starts properly rather than at half strength.
The lagoon at dusk · an oruwa on the sand · the sun going down
Days 2–3 · Sigiriya · two nights
The rock, then the elephants
North past Pinnawala, where the herd is walked down to the river to bathe. Up at first light on the second morning for the climb - twelve hundred steps, and the water gardens laid out below when you turn around.
Day 4 · Kandy
A painted ceiling and a drumbeat
Dambulla first: five caves, a hundred and fifty Buddhas, every inch of ceiling painted. Then south into the hills, and the Kandyan dancers in the evening.
Day 5 · Nuwara Eliya