K day

Kandy

We started off with a visit to the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, where the left canine tooth of Buddha is enshrined, this is the same tooth that used to be kept in the ancient temples in Polonnaruwa. Our guide rattled off a bunch of facts and figures as we walked through the grounds and into the temple, just in time for the tooth ceremony where they remove the tooth for people to see. 

As they started opening the chamber where the tooth was stored the huge crowd surged, the devout buddhists in the crowd pushed to get a glimpse of the tooth. We managed to get a view of the gold chamber where the tooth was stored before being swept onwards. It was an interesting experience but not really enjoyable due to the crowd, and it was a bit weird having a bunch of tourists who didn't really understand the significance of the relic taking up prime viewing positions from the faithful locals.

K had missed out on quite a few attractions in Sri Lanka as a result of being sick, but for the rest of the day we were finally going to focus on her interests. 

We visited a gem and jewellery specialist in Kandy, as Sri Lanka is the home of the Ceylon Sapphire. We watched a very interesting video about how the sapphire mines are constructed, then given a tour of the workshop where they they even cleaned K's rings for her. In the shop we were shown samples of all sorts of precious and semi-precious stones, then left to browse all of the jewellery that was for sale. We managed to leave without spending a cent (fortunately).

From there we drove another hour to the small town of Molagoda, and stopped at the government run Molagoda Pottery Crafts Training Center. We were given a demo of throwing then a tour through the rest of the studio and the kiln. We finished off in their small shop with quite a range of very cheap ceramics and examples of other crafts. We were not able to leave this place without spending a cent (unfortunately).

Back in Kandy M was dropped off at the  Royal Botanic Gardens Peradeniya while K returned to our room. The gardens were quite extensive and interesting, with many varieties of tropical plants as well as a nice orchid collection.