sasri2016 – Going up to Lion's rock in Sigiriya

You need to go there very early. I had breakfast at the hotel (Hotel Sigiriya) 06:30 and was ready to go there about 07:00. Executed as scheduled. But even this was a bit late for me. I did sweat so unbelievably when going up all those stairs. If I had been there during the sunrise, it would have been much easier. Though some of my extraordinary sweating might have been caused by yesterday's Ayurvedic treatments. Because I did sweat already yesterday evening an oddly lot. Okay, it was 30C heat during the night, when I had dinner. If I would have had strength, I should have waited to later night time to go eating and it might have been easier. Food is really great in this hotel, so it was sad to not be able to enjoy it as much as I should have.

Lion's rock palace's legend is, that there were two kings fighting (or something like this) and the prince of another king was sent (or left) hiding to that rock. This would have been somewhere 500 - 650 AD. Temple/palace is said to have been built during that time.

Climb to the top is quite hard. There are a lot of stairs and if the heat is already there, then you need to be in good shape and have a body that doesn't sweat easily. There were a lot of Chinese people coming up, when I was already going down. Most of them were already in senior age. So even as they are smaller and lighter than I am, also them were sweating and very tired, like I was. I could see the agony in their eyes, when I passed them (I probably looked quite same, when I was going up). I was glad that I had already been there before them, because the hordes of Chinese always keep a lot of noise.

This rock also has big wasps/bees and there are (at least two) warnings saying, that you should be silent and still, if hornets attack. When I saw how big they are – and I was breathing heavily like an ass – I got bit worried about them. When I was like half way up, there was a big bee trying to get hold of that chrome handrail – gladly I didn't have my hand there and interrupt its business. ;)

Sadly couldn't take a picture of it.

There are awesome views at the top and I also found one cooler place, where wind was little bit helping from the heat and there was a shadow of a tree, under which you could lay down in safe from sun's worst rays.

Price for tuk-tuk from Hotel Sigiriya's road to Lion's rock is 200 rupies. Paid same price to come back. There are couple touts in the Lion's rock area. One guy told me he is help-boy, which I didn't laugh, because I was little bit irritated by sweating already. Though I did saw two helpers aiding an older french lady to get up stairs. And stairs are not easy, as some are really small for my feet and then coming down is a bit dangerous. But as I am not a light man, going up is much harder for me.