Of Leopards and Bears @ Yala National Park, Sri Lanka

We’ve checked in to the Yala Village for 3 nights. We’ve arrived late on our first night there so we have a fairly early night in anticipation of a full day safari in the national park with a small break for lunch.  Yala National Park is one of Sri Lanka’s premier wild life parks popular for big cats, sloth bear, elephant and other mammals and numerous birds.

The village is set in a beautiful location with the observation deck above the restaurant looking out to the park, the pool and the ocean.  In fact, I spent a fair bit of time up there writing my blog and catching up with friends on Skype!I had almost willed the Universe to provide me a leopard sighting, and well..what can I say!  Leopard was the first thing we saw that morning..:) It was in a perfect spot..on top of a rock..and if not for the numerous other jeeps jostling for position, it could not have been more perfect!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The shots are not perfect, because the leopard spent too much time either sleeping or looking the other way…but it could have been a whole lot worse! The park is full of crocs, and we saw wetlands with more than a dozen crocs, coexisting with painted storks and other birds.  Interesting!  

 

 

 

 

This is one part of the island that was badly affected by the Tsunami.  Many hotels including the one I had stayed in when I visited as a kid had been washed away.  I spoke with one of the hotel staff who related to me how he got swept away with the massive wave and only survived by climbing a tree and staying up there for hours.  Many tourists lost their lives that day and we visited a monument/art feature in the park remembering some Germans and Japanese tourists who had been swept out to sea. 

We don’t see as many elephants as we did at Uda Walawe but there was the occasional herd and quite a few bull elephants. The were many aquatic and other birds and the wetlands here were just as spectacular as at Bundala.

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are many monitors, lizards and goannas in the park and the hot weather meant I got some good shots of them sunning themselves.  

There are many water buffalo sloshing about in the water but I liked this guy ‘cos he looks a bit majestic! We saw many more species including elk, deer and a tusker but right at the end of the day we got really lucky and also saw a sloth bear.  Unfortunately, he was fast asleep in the tree so the picture isn’t very revealing!

While we had the park to ourselves for most of the day, the bear and leopard sightings seemed to almost always result in a convergence of every single vehicle in the park!  A bear jam perhaps?

And so we came to the end of a long, tiring day on bumpy roads with lots of excitement.  While Yala National Park may not have the variety or quantity of wild life found in Africa, it does have its fair share of excitement and you will certainly not be disappointed if you visited!

I should like to spend my whole life travelling, if only I could borrow another to spend at home" William Blake

Bundala Bird Sanctuary

The Bundala Bird Sanctuary is the only Ramsar wetland in Sri Lanka.  Ramsar, a city in Iran was where a convention was held to identify wetlands of international significance. 

The Ramsar Convention is an intergovernmental treaty that provides guidance for national action and international cooperation for the conservation of wetlands.  The Convention's member countries cover all geographic regions of the planet and it is exciting to be in Sri Lanka’s one and only!

The drive leading up to this area is beautiful, with majestic trees and beautiful temples.

We hire a jeep with a tracker and driver and set off to explore.  Our first sightings are a group of cheeky monkeys who amuse us with their antics and a little day old baby.  Unfortunately, this is not the best time to see bird life in Sri Lanka as the season for migratory birds is the Northern Hemisphere winter.  Still, we see our fair share of aquatic birds and other animals and I’m happy to be doing some 4 wheel driving again! One of my favourite shots in the park was this one of the croc with its mouth wide open.  It honestly looked like a plastic replica and I couldn’t get enough of him!More interesting aquatic birds which include the Indian darter and the cormorant follow.

I would like to come back when the flamingos are visiting from India but today I settle for sightings of painted stork! 

Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar territory.  ~G. Behn

Exploring Uda Walawe & Surrounds

We are taking it a little easy on our second day in Uda Walawe, but you might say it is all relative!  We have checked in to Kalu’s hideaway, a beautiful boutique hotel tucked in behind a scrub jungle and hidden from view till you are right in front of the doorway.

Built by Romesh Kaluwitarana, one of Sri Lanka’s famous cricketers, it is a beautiful eco friendly jungle retreat perfect for those occasions when you want to get away from it all.  I loved the water feature in front.  There are no gutters in the construction of this hotel and the water trickles down the wires to ornamental pots where it is collected and reused in the garden!

We start the day at the elephant rehabilitation centre where young elephants who are orphaned or abandoned are hand fed and released to the wild after about 9 years.  Yes, I thought that was a long transit period too! Our next stop was the Sankapala temple another ancient cave temple that has sprung up around a place where monks originally meditated.

More cave paintings depict this was an important element in ancient worship. 

We then visited one of the old “waluwes” in the area.  This place was once the palatial home of the village headman where every young bride in the area visited before she was allowed to enjoy her honeymoon!  The perks of power were evident then too. The place is now in much disrepair and I wondered why the government had not restored or perhaps converted this to a hotel where travellers could enjoy the glories of our past!

  “A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.”

Tracking Wild Elephants in Uda Walawe

As we drive down the dusty roads of the Uda Walawe National Park I am excited to be back in the wild.  We have exchanged our van for a jeep which we have hired for the afternoon from the park.  It comes complete with a local tracker.This park is famous for its herds of wild elephants but it is also home to various water birds, water buffalo, monkeys and crocodiles. 

Tall grasses the staple diet of the elephants, covers the entire landscape and during the wet season this thick covering can be a bit of a hindrance to those of us on safari here!The female elephant is the matriarch of the herd and looks after the young.

The bull elephants hang out alone and can often act in a threatening manner to the tourist trucks packed full of travellers with their massive zoom lenses primed for a bit of action.   We have our own moments of excitement as a couple of elephants approach our truck directly.  The guide explains that we just wait it out (which  freaks my aunt out completely) but if we did turn on the engine and move, the elephant assuming we are retreating out of fear could potentially give chase.  I am quite delighted at the digital moments this provides and happily snap away, completely confident the guides will keep us safe from marauding elephants. 

The tracker explains the various hand gestures they use to ward off the elephants and if all else fails, a big punch to the ear ensures the elephant leaves us alone.  All good in theory but I wonder if there are times when this strategy fails? 

Fortunately for us, we lived to track another day!   "How much does a person live, after all? Does he/she live a thousand days, or only one? For a week, or for several centuries? How long does a person spend dying? What does it mean to say 'for ever'?" Pablo Neruda

Trekking Mini Adam’s Peak, An Ayurvedic Massage & an Ancient Temple

We have woken up early morning (6 am to be precise) to go trekking and discover Ella’s mini Adam’s Peak.  Adam’s Peak is a very famous mountain in this area but it is not the season to trek up there, so I settle for the mini peak.  Patrick has joined me and Naufer will be our guide.

The weather is cool, the company great and the views spectacular.  We have packed a picnic breakfast and we aim to reach the top in about an hour.  It isn’t a hard climb and we continue our conversation from the night before, stop to watch the tea pluckers at work and marvel at the gorgeous scenery!  Patrick will continue on his journey around Sri Lanka and it is unlikely our paths will cross again as his travel plans are a little different to ours.

On the way back, Naufer takes me to a Ayurvedic massage place.  He negotiates a ‘local price’, for me and for the first time in my life, I enjoy a ‘local’ massage.  They pour oil on my head and body and I enjoy a full body massage (not dissimilar to the pressure point massages of South East Asia) before moving on to the steam bath capsule.  You lie flat inside this contraption and  the lid is shut after you with just your head protruding.  The heat is turned up and I can feel myself sweating profusely and dripping out my toxins.  Fifteen minutes of this and I am led to the sauna.  The floor of this little chamber has little hollows filled with local herbs and spices.  When the heat is turned on here, the air fills with the aroma of these medicinal herbs!  A great experience and another first time experience for me.  I come away feeling refreshed, the aches of the climb replaced with a body that feels invigorated. (sorry – no pics!)

It is time for us to check out from the
Ella guest house and make our way to the town of Uda Walawe where we plan on going on an elephant safari.  On the way we visit the Dova temple, an ancient cave temple.The temple is 2000 years old and murals painted on wet plaster adorn the cave temple walls. It is very much a temple that is used today so I try to not disturb the devotees as I snap my pictures.  

The drive down to Uda Walawe is quite spectacular.   We take a break at the beautiful cascading Ravana Falls and say good bye to the hill country.  We are headed to the south east, a drier, hotter part of Sri Lanka.I realise we are approaching the dry zone when I excitedly spot the first of many rain water tanks, and of course we stop so I can chat to the residents.  I have never seen a tank that is almost the same size as the house!  The owner tells me the tank only provides water for half the year.  During the dry season they fetch water on the bikes from about a km away.  Not everyone gets to turn on a tap and take for granted there will access to clean water, a basic human right!  The tank water is just used for consumption and the adjacent lake used for bathing and washing clothes.We arrive at Uda Walawe in the late afternoon and after a lovely meal of rice and curry we prepare to go on an elephant safari.  I can’t wait!

“If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay at home.” – James Michener

Invoking the Rain Gods

Village life in Sri Lanka revolves around agriculture and so ensuring there is enough rain at the right time of year is very important to the cycle of life here.  The Kandy (a main city here) Perahera or pageant held after the southwest monsoon and just before the northeast monsoon is a rain making festival that involves honouring the sacred tooth relic.  Buddhist believe this relic, believed to be a tooth of the Buddha’s has the power to invoke the rain gods and bring down the monsoons breaking the drought.

Legend has it that the British suspended this pageant for 3 years in 1826.  The village chiefs and monks finally persuaded the then Governor, Sir Edward Barnes to hold the pageant once more.  The final day of the pageant was celebrated with a massive downpour that resulted in floods and the pageant has now become a time honoured tradition.

Many similar pageants are held during various times of the year in other parts of the country and we were lucky to witness one in Ella during Poson, which marks the occasion when Buddhism was introduced to Sri Lanka.  While these other pageants are not strictly rain making festivals, they have the same elements of the Kandy Perahara.  Poson is an occasion worthy of a celebration, and the pageant is a way of bringing the village together in a moment of joyous bonding. 

I’ve walked down the street with Patrick, his uncle and Naufer my guide.  The procession commences with lots of colour and noise.  The whip crackers lead the procession symbolising the sound of thunder followed by a number of elephants who represent rain clouds. This pageant will be played out again at night with fire dancers who symbolize lightning. 

In Kandy, the sacred tooth relic is carried in a casket by a tusker and the Poson pageant also represents this element minus the relic. 

This is also a time for the famous Kandyan and other dancers to show off their skills.  Sri Lanka dance is a very important part of the culture and the dancers are intricate and graceful and always a crowd pleaser.   They are performed to the accompaniment of traditional instruments that include drums, wind instruments, and cymbals.   Growing up Kandyan dancing had been part of our curriculum and I still remember learning some of the more simpler versions of this dance. 

It is also a time to amuse the crowds and the masked dancers with their antics never fail to draw a laugh.

The pageant while mainly a Buddhist celebration also brings together elements of Hindu beliefs which are shared with the Buddhist faith.  This intermingling of beliefs has its origins in the days when Sinhala Kings took Indian brides who were of the Hindu faith to be their wives.  The Kavadi dancers, always a part of these pageants are an example of this.

The evening pageant over, we break for dinner.  Patrick invites me to join them and I help them choose their food.  It is great to be finally in a country where I understand the language, know what is on the menu and I can be of assistance to fellow travellers.  We chat over dinner and exchange travel tales and share our personal stories.

Patrick has grown up in France but has spent the last 4 years in Florida.  We find out we are almost the same year, born in the same year but a few months a part.  Originally involved in the restaurant business he is just about to get his licence as a physio therapist.  He has dreamt of visiting Sri Lanka for more than 20 years and is happy his dream has finally been realised.  He is on a 5 week vacation, resting and recovering from the pressures of his life and will spend part of this time in France.  We drink a toast to our shared passions and tuck into dinner. 

After dinner we walk down the road again to watch the night procession.  There is a buzz in the air and you can feel the excitement and anticipation.  The place is packed and we try and manoeuvre a vantage point that will enable us to both see what is going on and get some good photos.  The entire village and all of the visitors in town have turned up to watch. 

It is basically the same procession but with lights and fire and somehow the same occasion at night seems to be filled with much more excitement coupled with the throb from the throng around me.  I am so happy to have witnessed this.  It is probably more than 20 years since I have seen a pageant and it was wonderful to have also shared this experience with a couple of fellow travellers.  

“For a people involved in agriculture, is there a god higher than the rain cloud?” J.B. Disanayaka