Eight places worth the drive

Cultural Triangle

A fifth-century palace built on top of a 200-metre granite plug, with the remains of a lion gateway, mirror-polished walls and frescoes halfway up the cliff.

• History
• Views
• Early risers

Central Highlands

The last independent kingdom on the island, built in a bowl of hills around a lake, and home to the Temple of the Tooth.

• Temples
• Gardens
• The train south

Uva Highlands

A one-street hill town at 1,000 metres, wedged in a gap in the mountains, with the most photographed railway bridge in South Asia twenty minutes' walk away.

• Hiking
• The railway
• Cool nights

South Coast

A Dutch-built fort on a headland, still lived in, with ramparts you can walk the whole way round and a working lighthouse at the corner.

• Architecture
• Evenings
• Shopping

South Coast

A crescent beach with a headland at one end and the deepest water close to shore anywhere on the south coast — which is why the whales are here.

• Whale watching
• Surf
• Doing nothing

Southeast Dry Zone

Scrub, rock outcrops and brackish lagoons on the southeast coast, holding the highest density of leopards recorded anywhere in the world.

• Leopards
• Elephants
• Dawn starts

Central Highlands

A hill station at 1,900 metres that the British built to feel like Surrey, surrounded on all sides by the tea estates that pay for it.

• Tea estates
• Cool weather
• Horton Plains

Cultural Triangle

The island's first capital, occupied for well over a thousand years, spread across forty square kilometres of dagobas, tanks and monastery ruins.

• Ancient history
• Pilgrimage
• Cycling