Udawala-we are going on safari!

Day 10, Udawalawe

Udawalawe is one of many National Parks in Sri Lanka, but is rated highest by Lonely Planet. If you asked any Sri Lankan where to safari, they’d say Yala in an instant, but we’ll get there later. Udawalawe National Park is medium sized but quiet, comparatively to Yala, at least. It is the highest density area of Elephants in the country. It also has monkeys, deer, turtles, buffalo, snakes and millions of birds. Seeing a leopard is nigh impossible here, you go to Yala for that.

Our 6 hour safari started at 12.15, and an open topped jeep arrived at the ‘hotel’ with a smiley driver. They had packed us lunch, water and a couple of beers in a cool box (without ice in it, so nothing was particularly cold). We trundled around the park for about 5 hours with the rest of the hour being travel there and back. The park was a series of fairly wide dirt tracks that could get pretty bumpy so we had to hold on tight. Billie was an excellent safari partner; she has keen eyes that girl. The driver’s eyes were even keener though and he was spotting tiny birds and kite nest’s with just the tip of a kite’s head poking out from a mile away. He was fairly incredible. We didn’t encounter TOO many other jeeps once we got past the entrance area, and would sometimes go half an hour without seeing one. It was serene and peaceful and the driver found and showed us a great mix of animals.

Our accommodation was lovely and we wished we were staying there an extra night but such is life, what time we had was great! It was the first time we’d had a pool since our first stop so we revelled in it.

This is a picture post. See below the best images of creatures and nature I could lay my hands on. Unfortunately through the mobile app I can’t add captions to the photos, so I’ll write the name of the thing (if I know it) below each image.

See you next time for Tissa, where Billie and I go on a boat trip and the ominous Yala National Park opens its gates.