Magnificent: Visitors ascend the stairway to the ancient structure, which contains caves prepared by devotees of the Buddhist Sangha

Idyllic: The rock, pictured here at dawn, upon which the temple and monastery were built is a 'magma plug'

Beautiful: Sigiriya is framed by symmetrical water gardens which extend to the foot of the rock. It is one of the eight World Heritage Sites of Sri Lanka

It was created in 386AD during the reign of Emporer Theodosius I apparently after two priests discovered a miraculous icon of the Virgin Mary in a cave on the mountain.

As with most of these great buildings, they aren't the easiest to access. In Greece, the Roussanou Monastery could only be accessed by baskets lifted by pulleys, until roads, steps and bridges were contructed in the 1920s.

It is one of six active monasteries in the Meteora complex, one the largest and most important developments of its kind, only behind Mount Athos.

The monasteries are built on natural sandstone rock pinnacles near the Pinios.