Dambulla

Dambulla is a city in Central province of Sri Lanka.

Understand
Dambulla is the largest and best-preserved cave temple complex in Sri Lanka. Major attractions are spread over five caves, which contain statues and paintings. These paintings and statues are related to Gautama Buddha and his life. There are a total of 153 Buddha statues, three statues of Sri Lankan kings and four statues of gods and goddesses.

Get in
Buses from Colombo (148 km west), Kandy (72 km south, 2-3 hours), Anuradhapura (2-3 hours), Sigiriya and other places arrive regularly at the Dambulla bus station located 1 km outside of the town on Kandy road. From Sigiriya, you can continue by direct bus to Dambulla. Buses run on this route at intervals of 30 minutes and cost 40 LKR. The last bus for Dambulla leaves at 18:00. Alternately, you can take a tuk-tuk to go back to Inamaluwa junction, from where you can take the bus to Dambulla as well, or you can go to Dambulla from Sigiriya by tuk-tuk which will cost not more than Rs. 1,000. The distance from Sigiriya to Dambulla is 20 km, and from Inamaluwa to Dambulla is 10 km.



Do

 * Cricket: First class matches and internationals are played at Rangiri Dambulla Stadium, by the lake 2 km southwest of city centre.

Sleep
There are both simple guest houses and more up-scale resorts available, some close to the temple complex, about 1 km south from the town centre.

Go next

 * Colombo There are several buses to Colombo from the bus station, it costs about 140 LKR in non A/C buses.
 * Anuradhapura
 * Sigiriya Just 30mn north-east of Dambulla, you can easily visit Lion Rock as a day trip from Dambulla (buses at the Main Bus Station)
 * Matale
 * Kandy
 * Polonnaruwa located 67 km east of Dambulla