The island's first capital and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Anuradhapura was a great Buddhist civilisation for over a millennium. Its vast sacred city holds towering brick stupas, monastery ruins, and the Sri Maha Bodhi — a tree grown from a cutting of the one the Buddha sat beneath, and among the oldest planted trees on earth.
About 4 to 4.5 hours from Colombo, or 1.5 hours from Sigiriya.
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A 5th-century rock fortress rising sheer from the jungle plain.
