Peradeniya Botanical Garden
Peradeniya Royal Botanical Gardens, the finest of its kind in Asia, the largest of the botanical gardens of Sri Lanka, couldn't be better located. This visit to this garden will provide spectacles at extraordinary beauty and absorbing interest for any nature lover and casual visitor. The distance from Colombo is 110 km and 6.4 km from Kandy.
The history of the Royal Botanic Gardens dates as far back as 1371 when King Wickramabahu III ascended the throne and kept court at Peradeniya near Mahaweli Ganga. Later, in the reign of King Kirti Sri Rajasinghe from 1747 to 1780 this was made a Royal Garden and from 1780 – 1798 King Rajadhi Rajasinghe resided therein, where a temporary residence was erected for him.
Peradeniya is well known for large variety of plants ornaments, useful machine and other creepers that produce the special spices at Sri Lanka. The great lawns highlight huge tropical trees and variety at bamboo can be found in one place.
Hakgala Botanical Garden
Hakgala. We are in Central Highlands (Up country) of Sri Lanka. Hakgala Gardens lie beneath the towering Hakgala Rock some 10km south of Nuwara Eliya (Little England) with majestic views across hills receding in tiers into the distance. Among the gardens in the island, Hakgala Botanical Gardens is second only to renowned Perdeniya Royal Botanical Gardens of Kandy, the gateway to the Central highlands.
The rock of Hakgala (Jaw Rock) rises 450 meters (1500 feet) above the gardens & believed to be one of the two places (the other being the cave at Ella) where King Rawana held Sita, consort of Lord Rama of great Indian epic Ramayana. The soil of the area around Sita Eliya temple close to the Gardens is darker than elsewhere in the island. According to the legend, it was in this area Lord Hanuman, in his rage, wreaked havoc on the villages & the forests: his tail was set on fire by King Rawana. The darkened soil is said to be no accident or design of nature. The strange circular depressions in the rock by the adjacent stream are believed to be the footprints of King Rawana's elephant. Of course all of these tales belong to Mythology in Sri Lanka. The present botanic gardens were founded in 1860 by the eminent British botanist Dr. G.H.K. Thwaites who was superintendent of the more famous gardens at Peradeniya, near Kandy.
It was the site initially for experiments with cinchona whose bark yielded quinine, esteemed as a tonic and febrifuge. Quinine at that time was widely used as a specific for malaria. This was perhaps the reason for the popularity of and tonic in these parts - quinine being the principle ingredient of tonic water. The cool, equable climate of the hakgala area, whose mean temperature is around 6 degrees Fahrenheit, encouraged the introduction of suitable temperate zone plants, both ornamental and useful. These included conifers and cedars from Australia, Bermuda and Japan, and cypresses from the Himalayas, china and as far a field as Persia, Mexico and California. New Caledonia gave Hakgala a special variety of pines and there are specimens of this genus from the canary Island as well.
An English oak, introduced around 1890, commemorates the "hearts of oak" of Britain's vaunted sea power, and there is a good-looking specimen of the camphor tree, whose habitat is usually in regions above 12,000m.
If you have left your heart in an English garden, you will surely find it again in Hakgala's Rose garden. where the sights and scents of these glorious blooms can be experienced in their infinite variety. From there it is a quiet stroll from the sublime to the exotic sophistication of the orchid House. A special attraction here is the verity of orchids, many of them endemic to Sri Lanka.
It would be in the worst possible taste to describe the Fernery as a collection of "vascular cryptograms" But that is how the dictionary describes the plant whose delicate fronds conjure up visions of misty grottoes, lichen-covered stones and meandering streams. The Fernery at Hakgala is a shady harbor of many quiet walks, in the shade of the Hakgala Rock, shaped like the jawbone of an elephant, from which the place gets its name. Sri Lanka's ferns are well represented here, as are those of Australia and New Zealand.
Hakgala is a temperate hill-country garden where also the languid low-country lotus and water lily floats in their serene loveliness. Pinks and blues emerging from a flat- floating background of lush leaves, recall the calm of yellow-robed monks, white-clad, devotees and flickering oil lamps.
In time, the highlands bracing breezes dispel the languor of lotus land and even cause a shiver as a temperature lowers. The Hakgala Botanical Gardens is one of the lovely contrasts of Sri Lanka, a home to plants and trees from around the world, making them seem to be part of the scenic beauty.
