Sri Lanka, planned properly
Serendib Trails builds routes through Sri Lanka's ancient cities, misty tea hills, wildlife parks and southern coast, timed to the season and paced for the way you actually like to travel.
Four ways to see the island
Most of our itineraries mix at least two of these, since nothing on this island sits far from something completely different.
Walk the terraces of Sigiriya, the ruined courts of Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura, and the sacred streets of Kandy, where a 2,500-year continuous Buddhist tradition is still very much in daily use rather than roped off behind glass.
Yala has one of the highest leopard sighting rates of any park in the world, and Udawalawe and Wilpattu add elephants, sloth bears and, off the south coast between November and April, blue whales.
Mirissa for whale watching and easy surf, Unawatuna for calm swimming inside a reef bay, Arugam Bay for serious wave breaks from May to September, and quiet stretches near Galle if you just want the tide for company.
Nuwara Eliya sits at 1,868 metres with a climate closer to an English spring than a tropical island, and the train from Kandy to Ella crosses the Nine Arch Bridge through tea estates that still supply Ceylon tea to the world.
Where to start
A 200-metre granite column with a 5th-century palace on top, frescoes on the rock face, and mirror-polished walls with graffiti that is over a thousand years old.
A 17th-century Dutch-built fort still lived in today, with ramparts you can walk at sunset and streets of converted trading houses, cafes and small galleries.
A small hill-country town used as a base for the Nine Arch Bridge, Little Adam's Peak and Ella Rock, with tea fields on every side of the valley.
"We told our planner we wanted temples and beaches and thought we'd have to choose. Sri Lanka doesn't ask you to choose, and neither did the itinerary."
— Traveller feedback, southern coast & cultural triangle route