Travel in Anuradhapura

Anuradhapura sits on the dry northern plain, well away from the hill country and the beaches most Sri Lanka itineraries are built around. It was the political and religious centre of the island for roughly 1,400 years, founded beside the Sri Maha Bodhi tree, and it remains the country's most significant archaeological site. It is also still in use. The sacred precinct is one of the most important Buddhist pilgrimage destinations in Sri Lanka, so this is not a fenced-off ruin field.

One trip in our Sri Lanka programme goes there: The wonderful world of Sri Lanka, 13 days, from EUR 750. Anuradhapura is day 11. It follows the Sigiriya day and comes before the drive south to the beach at Negombo. The itinerary does not list a night in the city itself — this is one full day of sightseeing, not a base you settle into.

The day is built around two sites, and they are opposites. Isurumuniya Temple was built among grey granite boulders and once served as a religious school for children. Its stone sculptures have survived well, including the reliefs of bathing elephants by the adjoining pond, and the scale is human. The Ruwanwelisaya Dagoba, on the grounds of the Mahavihara monastery, is the other extreme. The white stupa stands 108 metres high with a circumference of 2,090 metres, making it the second-largest Buddhist structure in the world, and 344 carved black elephants ring its base. It holds the largest collection of Buddha relics of any stupa on the island, which is why it is among the most venerated places in the country.

Be realistic about what one day covers. The ancient city spreads across a large area of monastery ruins, reservoirs and stupas, and the itinerary names two of them plus the Bodhi tree the city grew around. That is an introduction to Anuradhapura, not a survey of it. Because every trip we run is private, the day can be lengthened or a night added on request — but that is a change to the itinerary, not something already in it, and it will affect the price.

The other five Sri Lanka trips do not go to Anuradhapura, and we would rather say so here than let you find out from a day-by-day later. Two of them, Between culture and jungle and Sri Lanka's glory, do work the cultural triangle from a base at Habarana, but their days there cover Sigiriya, Polonnaruwa and the cave temples of Dambulla and stop short of the northern plain. The remaining three stay in the hill country, the Sinharaja rainforest and the south coast. Anuradhapura is often grouped with Sigiriya and Polonnaruwa in general writing about Sri Lanka, which makes it easy to assume any cultural-triangle itinerary includes it. Ours do not, with the single exception above.