Peradeniya Botanical Gardens

Situated in a loop of the Mahaweli River and 6 km west of Kandy, the site of the gardens of Peradeniya was a seat of power between 1371 and 1377, during the time of the itinerant capitals; however, nothing remains from this period today. King Kirti Sri Rajasinha (1747–1780) created the garden as the royal pleasure garden and later came to live here. This garden covers some 60ha of trees, lawns, and flowering shrubs, including a 20-ha arboretum of more than 10,000 trees.

The park was constructed by the last king of the country, Sri Wickrama Rajasinha. Under British reign, the royal park became a botanical garden in 1821 and is the largest of Sri Lanka‘s three main botanical gardens. Here, exotic crops such as coffee, tea, nutmeg, cloves, rubber, and cinchona (quinine)– all of which later became important to Sri Lanka‘s economy– were tested. Sights include a palm avenue planted by the British in 1950. Another British import was the enormous spreading Javan fig tree (covering 1600 sq m), which sprawls across the lawn, grown from a sapling brought from the East Indies.

There are extensive, well-kept lawns and an Orchid House containing some rare species beside the outstanding collection of orchids. There is an avenue of cannonball trees and another of cabbage palms. Other palm trees are palmyra and talipot palms. Don’t miss the avenue of double coconut palms, or coco de mer (this name was given because sailors once thought it grew in the sea)– each coconut weighs from 10kg to 20kg. Among the exotic plants you can find Ficus elastica (latex-bearing fig or Indian rubber tree with buttress roots), an amazing avenue of drunken-looking Cook Pines, and some magnificent old specimen trees. There is an Octagon Conservatory, a fernery (ferns are displayed there), banks of giant bamboo from Burma, giant banyan trees, and numerous flower borders with cannas, hibiscus, chrysanthemums, croton, and colourful bougainvillea. The tank has water plants, including the giant water lily and papyrus reeds. Near the entrance there is an aromatic spice garden with carefully labelled trees.

In the center of the gardens, there is an artificial lake in the shape of the island of Sri Lanka, beside which a white-domed rotunda commemorates George Gardner, the superintendent of the gardens in the middle of the 19th century.