Luxury holidays in Sri Lanka

From mist-blanketed mountains to viridian tea plantations and lightly spiced cuisine, Sri Lanka presents a colourful travel prospect – as diverse as it is diminutive. Often described as ‘India light’, it packs all of the sub continent’s vibrancy into one tiny teardrop-shaped isle, where wildlife-dense parks, culture-rich highlands, exotic fort towns and footprint-free beaches are all within hassle-free reach of one another. Sri Lanka, we salute you...

Destinations in Sri Lanka

  • Ahangama is near horizontal in its laidbackness, with a strong surf scene and lush jungly scenery.
  • Swaying palms and ocean-sculpted, rattan-hued sands are the main draw in Ahungalla, a paradisaic beach town, with a prized location between Bentota and Balapitiya, that's fringed by jungle, a scenic lake and verdant backwaters.
  • In Sri Lanka's Southern Province, two hours' drive from capital Colombo, Balapitiya is a river-crossed, jungle-strewn, ocean-side escape.
  • Just a few hours' drive south of Colombo, Sri Lanka's west-coast town of Bentota is home to blissed-out beaches and lush tropical gardens.
  • Home to more than two million people, Sri Lanka’s capital is a riot of colour, colonial grandeur and a cosmopolitan dining scene.
  • On Sri Lanka’s southern coast, the small coastal market town of Dikwella is home to a long sandy beach and Sri Lanka’s largest seated Buddha statue.
  • Gal Oya National Park in Sri Lanka is one of the few places on earth where you can watch leopards and elephants living peacefully in their natural habitat.
  • A jaw-dropping fortress crammed with colonial flashbacks is at the heart of cosmopolitan Galle, a fishing town of 100,000 people on Sri Lanka’s sultry south-west coast.
  • Sri Lanka's lush inland Hill Country is home to luxuriant, emerald peaks dotted with colourful sari-clad tea-pluckers and white louvered tea factories submerged in the greenery like Mississippi riverboats bobbing in a very high tide.
  • A former royal capital and home of famous festival the Perahera, inland Kandy is the beating heart of the Hill Country, set around a serene lake surrounded by some of Sri Lanka's most evocative temples.
  • Secluded on Sri Lanka’s southernmost shores overlooking the Indian Ocean, beach-blessed Tangalle is the go-to place for laid-back, forget-about-everything lounging.
  • Dubbed the ‘Cultural Triangle’, this ancient region of Sri Lanka takes its name from the seven UNESCO World Heritage sites peppered throughout the region.
  • Trincomalee is the trouble-triumphing capital of Sri Lanka’s wild Eastern Province. The gateway to Uppuveli and Nilaveli beaches, it’s home to sacred trees, gilded temples and a historic natural harbour (praised by Nelson, Ptolemy and Marco Polo).

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