Tag Archives: Celebrity Cruises

Last week I showed you the Colombo National Museum, also known as the Sri Lanka National Museum. For a refresher see: Sri Lanka — Arriving to Colombo; Colombo National Museum and Sri Lanka — Colombo; Exploring the Colombo National Museum. Today I’m going to treat you to an extensive tour of the remarkable sights around the museum grounds to the south of the main entrance. After that, I’ll finish with two photographs of Colombo’s interesting skyline. So, let’s get started:

There is a lot of statuary awaiting you and your camera. Here is a sitting Buddha beneath what appears to be a bodhi tree:

A fun photographic subject here is, of course, the magnificent Italian architectural details of the museum building itself.

The vegetation on the grounds is quite photogenic as well. Alas, I’ve no idea what type of tree this is:

But the things I kept returning to were the statues:

Here are a couple of zoomed in photos of the above statues:

One more shot of the museum grounds before I leave you with two Colombo skyline shots:

About thirty minutes after we left the Colombo National Museum we arrived Gangarama Temple. While Ursula went inside, I stayed across the street to photograph the exterior of the temple, which I’ll show you on Wednesday. But while I was out there, I snagged these next two fun skyline shots. This first one features the Courtyard by Marriott Colombo with the unique slope-towered Altair behind. The Altair is also the tallest inclined building in the world:

This next building has a bit of a story to it. This is the uppermost part of the famous Lotus Tower. This free-standing tower rises 1,153 feet/351.5 meters. That makes Lotus Tower the largest self-supported tower in South Asia. Completed in 2019, it cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $110 million.

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On Monday I showed you several Hindu artifacts contained within the walls of the Colombo National Museum, but there are also Buddhist icons here as well. The image above is quite a famous one. The Statue of Tara shown above is a replica of the original looted by the British. The original was “gifted” to England in the 1830s by the Governor of Ceylon at the time, General Sir Robert Brownrigg, and that original is currently on display in the British Museum. The depicts the Buddhist Goddess Tara. It’s an impressive 4 ft. 8 in./143cm tall. Unfortunately, this replica is merely gold painted bronze rather than made using the original’s gilt-bronze craftsmanship.

I also mentioned on Monday that the museum contains regalia from the Kandyan monarchs who ruled the Kingdom of Kandy (present day Sri Lanka) from 1590 until the British overthrew the monarchy in 1815. The Kandyan Royal Throne shown above was gifted by the Dutch to the Kandyan King Vimaladharmasuriya II sometime around 1692-1693. At the invitation of the Kandyan Monarchy, in order to combat Portuguese rule, the Dutch East India Company controlled the coastal areas of Ceylon from 1640 until 1796, at which time they were displaced by the British. Another artifact from the days of joint Kandyan rule is the exquisitely ornate (bronze cast barrel with gold, silver, and rubies) ceremonial Lewke’s Canon, which the Dutch took in 1765 and only got around to returning to Sri Lanka in 2023:

Another pair of Kandyan artifacts that piqued my interest also date back to 1765. These are a pair of massive Maha Thuwakku, or wall guns.

Ursula loves old chests, so I photographed this next item at her request. It once belonged to Sri Vikrama Rajasinha, the last Kandyan monarch.

I’ll finish up today with this small photo gallery/slide show collection:

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