Flower Hour,  Flowers,  Sri Lanka,  Travel galleries

Gallery: the flowers of Sri Lanka

April 16, 2026 / 48 Comments

I must have flowers, always, and always

Claude Monet

Perhaps Monet should have visited Sri Lanka, where I found flowers aplenty to enjoy and to photograph. After all, he is inextricably linked to waterlilies, is he not, and the country’s national flower is the blue waterlily.

We saw these beautiful flowers everywhere, not just growing in lakes but also as offerings in Buddhist shrines in particular. This flower is considered a symbol of truth, purity and discipline. Despite the name it can also come in shades of violet, purple or pink. The flowers grow on stems that stand above the water level.

Click on any image to see where it was taken. The flowers bottom left were bought by our guide Champi for us to offer at the Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi, Anuradhapura, and are held by me. Champi himself holds the offerings bottom left, bought at one of the many stalls outside the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy.

Other waterlilies and lotuses

But why stop at blue waterlilies when there are other colours to be enjoyed too? The gallery below includes the colour version of the pink one that I shared in two different mono edits in my last Monochrome Madness post. Again, you can click on any image to see where it was taken.

The simple but lovely Negombo hotel (incongruously named the Swanee Grand), where we stayed both on the night of our arrival and before our flight home, had a pretty garden. While taking photos there I fell into conversation with the owner who was very proud of his waterlily pond. He took me to see where a white lotus bud was half-hidden by leaves. It was almost ready to burst into flower, just as a nearby bloom was fading and dropping its petals.

Other Sri Lankan flowers

And why stop at waterlilies at all? Here is a selection of other flowers I found.

As before, you can click on any of the photos to see where it was taken, and also the name of the flower. Cautionary note: while I know many of these flowers I had to ask Google Lens about a few, so it’s possible one or two names are incorrect. Please do leave a comment if you have a correction for me!

I’m sharing these for Terri’s Flower Hour challenge, especially as it’s been too long since I last took part!

I visited Sri Lanka in February 2026

48 Comments

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