Today started well.. Early 7am start for a nice bike ride in Anuradhapura. It was a balmy 29 degrees.. And I put the humidity at around 115%. Basically like riding in a swimming pool, but not as pleasant.
Luckily the first pit stop was a magnificent Stupa. For those don't know what that is, its an extremely large dome, which house some type of Buddhist relic. In the case of the first one we saw today it was a whole bowl of relics. You cant go inside and see, but its assumed, or people have faith, that its in there. The stupor is surrounded by large slabs of stone and you have to walk around it bare foot. The first stupa we saw today had thousands of people at it. Entire towns book in a time slot, to march under beautifully long pieces of coloured fabric, which they offer up to the Buddhists and it goes around the first level of the stupa. I'm nit sure if you can see the beautifully coloured fabric in the picture I'm posting today.
After that we saw more stupors! Old ones, newer ones, smaller ones.... I'm a bit stupaed out actually... Its a bit like churches in Europe!
We also saw the world's oldest recorded tree. Who'd have thought it was in Sri Lanka! It was grown from a tree that wad once in India (border changes mean its now in Nepal) and it was planted in 247BC. I was so excited to see it and thought it would be this amazing, sprawling, huge tree... See picture... Quite a disappointment. Oh well!
After that it was a bit more riding (at snails pace) and a light, delicious picnic lunch.
By 2pm we were all hot and bothered, and have since spent the last 4hrs by the hotel pool.
Dinner time!
Much love,
A x
Luckily the first pit stop was a magnificent Stupa. For those don't know what that is, its an extremely large dome, which house some type of Buddhist relic. In the case of the first one we saw today it was a whole bowl of relics. You cant go inside and see, but its assumed, or people have faith, that its in there. The stupor is surrounded by large slabs of stone and you have to walk around it bare foot. The first stupa we saw today had thousands of people at it. Entire towns book in a time slot, to march under beautifully long pieces of coloured fabric, which they offer up to the Buddhists and it goes around the first level of the stupa. I'm nit sure if you can see the beautifully coloured fabric in the picture I'm posting today.
After that we saw more stupors! Old ones, newer ones, smaller ones.... I'm a bit stupaed out actually... Its a bit like churches in Europe!
We also saw the world's oldest recorded tree. Who'd have thought it was in Sri Lanka! It was grown from a tree that wad once in India (border changes mean its now in Nepal) and it was planted in 247BC. I was so excited to see it and thought it would be this amazing, sprawling, huge tree... See picture... Quite a disappointment. Oh well!
After that it was a bit more riding (at snails pace) and a light, delicious picnic lunch.
By 2pm we were all hot and bothered, and have since spent the last 4hrs by the hotel pool.
Dinner time!
Much love,
A x
No comments:
Post a Comment