Negombo The fishing town beside the airport, for a first or last night

Where to stay in Negombo

Things to do from Negombo

• Culture and heritage · a short visit in Negombo townAngurukaramulla Temple and its dragon gatewayAngurukaramulla is a Buddhist temple in Negombo, a town better known for its Catholic churches, and it is entered through the open jaws of a huge dragon's head, said to keep evil spirits away from the temple and its devotees. Above the gateway sits a Buddha statue 6 m tall, raised over a pool, beside a large white stupa with bronze lions at its base.
• Adventure · about 2 hours, with a safety briefingKayaking the Negombo lagoonThe Negombo lagoon is a large estuarine lagoon, joined to the sea by a narrow channel near the town and fed by small rivers and the Hamilton Canal, known locally as the Dutch canal. Its shallow channels are paddled in single or double kayaks, past mangrove islands, with cormorants, herons, egrets and kingfishers along the banks.
• Dining · up to about 5 hours with a market visit; a demonstration alone is shorterA Sri Lankan cookery lesson with your hotel's chefSeveral of the lodges and hotels around Negombo and Bentota teach Sri Lankan cooking, arranged with your stay. Some keep to a demonstration by the chef of the curries served at the hotel's own table; others are hands-on, from a village-style class where the guest picks the ingredients and cooks them to a lesson in rice and curry, its spices and its traditional ingredients.
• Wellness · a morning or evening session, or daily through a stayYoga and meditation with your stay on the west coastSeveral of the hotels around Negombo and Bentota hold yoga and meditation for their guests, arranged with your stay. The settings range from an open-sided yoga pavilion in a garden to the beach at dawn, and the classes suit all levels, with a focus on posture, alignment and breathing.
• Culture and heritage · 2 to 3 hours on footA walk through Colombo Fort and PettahColombo Fort is the old colonial core of the city, and Pettah, just east of it, is its busiest market district, where each street keeps its own trade. A private guide links the two on foot and reads the Portuguese, Dutch and British layers of the city from its buildings.
• Culture and heritage · about 1.5 hours for bothGangaramaya Temple and Seema Malaka on Beira LakeGangaramaya is one of Colombo's most important Buddhist temples, completed in the late 19th century near Beira Lake, and its buildings mix Sri Lankan, Thai, Indian and Chinese styles. A few hundred metres east, its meditation hall Seema Malaka stands on 3 platforms in the lake, rebuilt to a design by Geoffrey Bawa in 1976.
• Culture and heritage · about 2 hours with a guideThe Colombo National MuseumSri Lanka's largest museum opened in 1877 in an Italianate building in Cinnamon Gardens, and holds the regalia of the Kandyan kings, including the throne of the last king of Kandy. Its galleries cover the island's cultural and natural heritage.
• Culture and heritage · about 1.5 hours, 11 km from central ColomboKelaniya Raja Maha ViharaKelaniya, 11 km north-east of Colombo, is held by Buddhists to be where the Buddha came on his third and final visit to the island, and its temple was rebuilt under King Kirti Sri Rajasinghe. It makes an easy half-day from Colombo or from Negombo.
• Nature and wildlife · about 2 hours on the water, best from about 06:30The Muthurajawela wetland by boatMuthurajawela is a 3,068 ha marsh at the southern end of the Negombo lagoon, the country's largest saline coastal peat bog, and 1,777 ha of it was declared a sanctuary in 1996. It lies about 30 km north of Colombo and close to the airport.
• Culture and heritage · an early morning, from about 06:00The Negombo fish market at dawnNegombo has been a fishing town for centuries, and its main market, known locally as Lellama, sits at the mouth of the lagoon where the boats land their catch and it is sold from first light. Fish, prawns, crabs, lobster and squid change hands before most of the town is awake.
• Culture and heritage · about 1.5 hoursThe churches of Negombo, 'Little Rome'Negombo is known as Little Rome for its Catholic majority and its many churches, a legacy of the conversions made under Portuguese rule; there are more than 25 Roman Catholic churches in the city. The Dutch left a fort, built in 1672, and a network of canals.
• Wellness · a day of treatments, or a programme of 7 days or moreAn Ayurveda programme on the west coastSri Lanka's Ayurveda follows the same Sanskrit texts as India's but differs in the herbs it uses, and it is regulated by the state, with about 20,000 registered practitioners. The Bentota and Beruwala coast is one of the island's main centres for Ayurveda retreats.