Water Garden Sigiriya - 30 Chic Designed Private Villas Overlooking Sigiriya

Amazing location and grounds. Service exceptional. Overall, highly recommended!!

This was my first stay at Water Garden Sigiriya, and I'm happy to say it definitely won't be my last! Everything from the moment our group arrived to the moment we left was excellent and I look forward to bringing more friends to experience this hotel soon. The staff of the hotel deserve a special shoutout. They were so accommodating and did everything possible to make our stay as comfortable and relaxing as possible and even arranged outside activities for us, including an elephant safari. The staff would go out of their way to make sure any special requests we had were fulfilled, and even gave us their WhatsApp contact info should we need to contact them for anything. The staff also helped my sister and her friend look for some of the crocodiles that populate the water gardens of the hotel, when one was spotted, they would contact her and show up at her villa in one of the hotel buggies ready to rush to the last known croc sighting location. The food at the hotel was delicious, the locals and foreign tourists our group comprised of loved everything that the kitchen made for us. The Sri Lankan food deserves particular praise and I'd highly recommend that all guests try their local Sri Lankan food options. The kitchen was also happy to make adjustments to their meals, one of which was having the kitchen make their Kottu using crab instead of the chicken they normally use. The kitchen was happy to oblige, and I have to say it was amazing! I highly recommend any guest put in a special request for a crab kottu, you won't be disappointed. The hotel has a few types of villas, our group got a duplex villa which could comfortably house 4 people in two separate bedrooms each with their own large bathroom. We also booked two Superior Deluxe villas which can comfortably house 2 to 3 people in one bedroom. Both of the villa types we had contained a private plunge pool, which is a great place to stargaze from on the clear nights. The villas are spacious, clean, and well appointed with modern amenities including universal plug points. The staff would also come by and ask if there was anything we needed, and would also leave homemade local treats like milk toffee or coconut toffee in the room after cleaning, which was a nice touch. I'd highly recommend getting a treatment from the spa, the masseuses are well trained and know how to release those tensed-up/knotted muscles. Be sure to book the day before as the spa can get booked up quickly. The hotel is on a very large property, so I'd recommend getting a bicycle from the lobby and using that to get around unless you're more fond of walking. There are also plenty of animals that also live in the property, including peacocks, monkeys, tortoises, and monitor lizards, which add to the ambiance of the hotel and create a unique experience when randomly encountering one of the animals when walking around the hotel grounds. Our group stayed for two nights, but by the end we wished we could have stayed long

There is nothing wrong with this hotel, but we found the food and service below the very high standards in the other hotels we stayed at in Sri Lanka. The accommodation itself is excellent - very clean, spacious, comfortable and we had an amazing view of the rock from our pool - thank you. We were on a half-board package and found the food both rather ordinary and a bit pretentious. The bread was not always fresh and the 5 ‍♀️ course dinner menu had limited options. Fresh water was not included with dinner - it was charged extra. The inside seating, when there wasn’t space on the veranda, was soulless. The service was reasonably efficient, but impersonal in comparison with the other hotels. In summary we had a fine, but not exceptional, experience.