According to the Indian epic poem Ramayana, the Lankan abductor King Ravana offered a pleasure garden to his Indian captive Sita, which later became known as Sita Eliya, a short distance downhill from Nuwara Eliya town. Hakgala Botanical Garden is situated close to this area and was established in 1861 first as an experimental cultivation of Cinchona which was later replaced by tea as a commercial crop and later in 1884 into a botanical garden.
This has transformed the gardens into an explosion of colour and is the only botanical garden in the country that has an abundance of sub tropical and temperate plants, almost giving a feel of having stepped into a foreign land. Whilst there are over 10,000 species of flora planted, the garden is perhaps best known for its Orchids and Roses.