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What a day! We woke early to pack and catch our bus to Dambulla from the Good Shed bus station, yes that's an actual bus station name?! After dodging a man trying to con us into thinking that his mini can was the actual bus, I wonder how much that would have cost! We jumped on the national bus service, these buses are pretty cool looking but with no air con and crammed seats it's no wonder we received concerned looks from locals with our big bags. We had to sit for two hours with one bag on our laps and the other on the floor in-between our legs. It was a very uncomfortable journey but the views, when we weren't feeling travel sick, were amazing! Looking over at the mountains and palm tree jungle. We even saw a few sneaky monkeys!
We lugged our bags off the bus, trying not to knock out the locals. It was baking hot at 11am, our legs were dead and we were dehydrated.... But this time we actually walked and found our hotel! It's a posh one this time so we are very happy, it even has air con and hot water!
We had a refresh and headed back out side to find the Dambulla Rock Cave Temple. In the boiling hot heat you walk up a number of stairways and paths surrounded by trees with lots of monkeys in, huge dragonflies and stray dogs. At the top of the hill you are able to see all the way across the valley of plam tree jungle covering hills, mountains and rivers. The temple is inside the hill you walk up, there are several different entrances leading into sections of the caves. Each section has been painted across the cave ceilings with Buddha's and patterns. While inside you have huge Buddha statues surrounding the cave. It's awe inspiring to think this was created hundreds of years ago. The monks walk around in their orange robes and Buddhist family's walk up the hill, some bare foot from the start to pray and lay flowers. The place was gorgeous and we are happy we braved the heat to walk up it even if we were sweaty and tierd.
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Fiona Hi Nic & Matt, You are so brave & thankfully you are as it seems you found something real interesting, pleased to hear that your new hotel is cool & comfortable. Yesterday I spent the whole day displaying my pottery and hanging pictures using an extremely fiddley wire hanging system, and today I took the guys to see their work on show. Feeling proud. Looking forward to your next update. Sending lots of love xxxxxx