Sri Lanka's original epithet — the Pearl of the Indian Ocean — is owed as much to the density of experience as to any physical characteristic. An island of 65,610 square kilometres contains: the world's densest leopard population in Yala, a 5th-century royal rock fortress at Sigiriya that rivals Machu Picchu as a feat of human ambition, a southern coast of Amanwella-quality beach, a hill country of Victorian tea estates producing some of the world's finest Ceylon, and a Buddhist culture of 2,300 years whose living expression — the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, the Dambulla Cave Temple — is active and accessible.
The accommodation has arrived: Wild Coast Tented Lodge's Ron Arad tents beside the Yala buffer zone, Amanwella's coconut-grove beach on the south coast, and the private lake island of Tri Lanka together constitute an accommodation portfolio that no comparably sized Asian destination can match for diversity of setting and standard.
For a couple who wants to travel — to move through a country rather than occupy a single resort — Sri Lanka is the most rewarding two-week proposition in the Indian Ocean region. The south-coast circuit from Colombo to Tangalle via Galle and Yala covers five distinct experiences without ever feeling rushed.
