Sri Lanka by Design and Tea: Geoffrey Bawa, Galle Fort, Kandy and Yala
A Sri Lanka route through Geoffrey Bawa's gardens, Galle Fort, tea country, Kandy and the leopards of Yala.
Photo: Krankman / Wikimedia Commons CC BY 3.0
Sri Lanka is small enough to cross in a week and varied enough to need two. The island works best as a loop that moves between three registers: the architecture and gardens of the south-west coast, the cool tea highlands, and the dry scrub where leopards hunt.
Architecture and gardens: the Bawa coast
Geoffrey Bawa, born in Colombo in 1919, shaped what is called tropical modernism, an architecture that borrows from traditional Sri Lankan forms and Dutch colonial ones and lets the landscape lead. His own garden at Lunuganga, near Bentota, is where it started, a project he worked on for decades and the best place to understand the idea.
You can visit Lunuganga on its own or build a route around his other work, including his hotels. Further south, Galle Fort is a Dutch-built colonial reference point rather than a Bawa building; the ramparts are best walked towards the end of the day.
Tea country
The highlands change the island’s tempo. The Pekoe Trail, the island’s first long-distance walking route, runs about 300 kilometres in 22 stages through the tea estates, and a single stage is enough to feel the landscape. Walk a stage, or travel by rail and estate on the tea-country journey.
Near Kandy, Santani Wellness Kandy is the island’s first purpose-built luxury wellness resort, set on a former tea estate. Kandy itself, a World Heritage site, is also the setting for the Esala Perahera, the great summer festival of lights and processions; plan dates around it only if you want to be there for the crowds.
Wildlife
The dry south-east is for animals. Yala National Park has leopards, sloth bears and elephants, and the best viewing comes on early-morning and late-afternoon drives. Wild Coast Tented Lodge puts a tented camp between the park and the ocean, and a leopard safari is the reason to stay.
Colombo
Begin or end in the capital. Galle Face Hotel is the 1864 seafront grande dame, and ITC Ratnadipa is a large modern alternative on the same strip.
Sources: Experience Travel Group: Geoffrey Bawa architecture tour; Abercrombie & Kent: Sri Lanka leopards and tea country. Check the official websites for current information.
Stay
Hotels in this guide
Sri Lanka · The Luxury CollectionITC Ratnadipa, a Luxury Collection Hotel, ColomboITC's first hotel outside India stands on the former Army Headquarters land at Galle Face.Experiences
Experiences in Sri Lanka
Cultural ImmersionSri LankaWalk the ramparts of Galle FortAn hour's walk along the sea walls and bastions of a seventeenth-century Dutch fortified town.
WildlifeSri LankaGo on a leopard safari in YalaJeep drives at dawn and dusk in a coastal national park with one of the world's highest leopard densities.EventSri LankaSee the Kandy Esala PeraheraTen nights of torch-lit processions with drummers.Journal
From the Journal
Feature · TravelWalking Sri Lanka’s Pekoe Trail: 300 Kilometres Through the Tea CountrySri Lanka's first long-distance path runs in 22 stages from Kandy to Nuwara Eliya along old estate tracks.October 8, 2026Feature · Design & ArchitectureGeoffrey Bawa’s Sri Lanka: A Guide to the Buildings of Tropical ModernismThe resort hotel open to the breeze, with its courtyards, pools and long verandas.October 8, 2026News · WellnessSantani at Ten: The Retreat That Put Sri Lanka on the Wellness MapOpened in 2016 on a former tea estate near Kandy.September 15, 2026