Heel Oya Village Tour

Heel Oya Village

The panoramic small hamlet Heeloya located in Dumbara Valley (the “misty valley”) in the famous and victorious hills of Kandyan kingdom is the most sought-after land by the kings in those days. The valley covered by green forests and encircling Blue Mountains was the best defensive fortress for the land-locked Upcountry kingdom and the kings treated the area with lavish royal patronage. The fertile soils of the valley are a miraculous oasis for agronomics of the nation. This place of Srilankan authenticity is surrounded by a range of mountains augmented by an array of cascading waterfalls and rivers which irrigate the fertile lands for paddy cultivation and other agricultural purposes.

Heeloya village is also a hidden gem of history of the country. The paddy lands of this village have been devoted to the Bambaragala Cave Temple by the ruling kings during the 2nd or 3d century BC according to the historians. Brahmi inscriptions on the top of the cave reveal that the ruling King of that era had bequeathed this cave temple to the Sangha. The ruins of the ancient granary and existing renovated granary which belonged to Bambaragala cave temple are still in this village as solid evidence to this episode. King Kirthi Sri Rajasinghe, (1747-1782 AD) had also developed the water canals to irrigate the paddy lands of Bambaragala cave temples by the waters of the Kaludiya Wala (Black Water-pool); a hidden waterfall closer to the village. Hence, the history of this village runs well over 2000 years. Former Archeological Commissioner Dr. Senerath Paranavithana in his Inscriptions of Ceylon, Vol. 1 (1970), writes about the Bambaragala rock inscriptions dated beyond 2nd century and 3rd century BC.