Sri Lanka Day 19

Kafka and the Kindle

Homeward bound. Again a pre-breakfast walk in the garden for Peg and me. Followed by a great breakfast buffet. Saying goodbye to Caggy who was leaving on a different early flight and we left a bit later at 9.30 for the 10min to the airport. We gave tips and thank yous to Mukesh and Saman up near our room and to the driver and cleaner as we boarded. Amanda and Mark were also leaving a day later but hitched a lift to the airport then the centre of Colombo, so we said goodbye at the airport. Hopefully we will meet a few people at the Birdfair this year, it’s been, I think, the most sociable group we’ve had. Surprisingly Peg and I were amongst the best birders, a complete difference from Costa Rica and Cambodia where we felt completely bewildered!

The airport experience was straightforward except…

I’d realised two days ago that I didn’t have my Kindle, basically because I was too tired to even think about reading till then. By thinking back I reckoned that I had probably left it in the pocket of the seat on the flight over. It was too late to investigate then but I said I’d try at the airport. Once through security I enquired at the Sri Lanka airlines desk. After a few phone calls it transpired that it had been found but because it was more than two weeks it had been passed on to customs for some reason and wasn’t sure it could be retrieved. After a while it was decided it was possible and I, but not Peg, was invited to go back to the bowels of the airport. Because I was going behind security, we were accompanied at all times by a security guard. Security was tight here because of previous terrorist problems. At the Sri Lanka baggage place a complex combination of computer databases, large ledgers and loose leaf binders led to the production of two forms and a letter for customs. More walking back to baggage reclaim area for arrivals and the head of customs. More ledgers, a series of boxes from a safe full of yellow envelopes tied with string and sealed with sealing wax finally found mine! Calculation of the cost at R50 per day, R950 or £2, off to another desk to pay, more ledgers, back to customs and I had it! Although about an hour, fascinating experience, cheerful, helpful.

This killed most of the time, while Peg had wondered where we had gone! We were now close to boarding for the flight, which had arrived on time. However, technical issues? gave an hour’s delay and a move of gate, done without yet another security scan. We chatted a lot with Martin and Joyce and boarded which is where I’m writing this.

So, what are our impressions? Yet another fantastic holiday. Well planned, good accommodation, great guides and great company. It confirms that this type of holiday suits us down to the ground.

It was unusual to be some of the best and most keen birders and we are wondering about trying a trip that is even more based around pure birding. Would be very nerdy and would need to be somewhere where you didn’t feel you were missing out on anything else.

In this trip it was a bit heavily loaded with temples at the beginning because most of the famous temples are in that position.

We are,  however, constantly aware of how privileged we are to be able to do these things, both financially and health/personality wise.

As far as Sri Lanka is concerned, we loved it. It made us realise that Rajasthan had really dramatic inequality, ossified by the still strong caste system and a rather misogynistic vibe. Sri Lanka appeared to be none of these. We saw none of the absolutely abject poverty, so obvious in India. People interacted in an open friendly equal way.

The level of English, even in staff in hotels, was surprisingly poor. The general look was definitely “third world” , somewhat chaotic, often poor maintenance, impromptu markets etc. Traffic was also like India but nowhere near as thick. Most people seem to have no transport or a motorbike/scooter.

Kids all wear immaculate white uniforms, which apparently they wash themselves when they get home each day. Girls in dresses boys in shorts then long white trousers and shirts with ties.

Food suited us well. Red rice, like brown rice, a thick dhal, several vegetable curries/bhaji or what they call “tempered” cabbage or whatever, and maybe one meat or fish dish. The standard was quite spicy but really flavoursome. Very seldom any flatbread but always papadums which were thicker than ours.

The landscape was really nice. Everyone’s idea of tropical, palm trees, coconuts, rain forest, green, lush, verdant, with some brown granite boulders or crags.

The presence of Buddhism with temples of some sort in most villages with a white stupe and a large Buddha statue. Every so often a couple of monks in saffron robes.

Birding was probably better than expected, we saw 30 of the 34 or so endemic species, more than 200 species overall with about a third of them new to us (“lifers”). There was a good overlap with Rajasthan and Cambodia but just right to help us without being boring.

Sri Lankan airlines were really good. Friendly and helpful staff, good food, real cutlery, reusable food containers, real glasses, entertainment that worked and worked hard to restore my Kindle. Can’t really fault them, except both planes an hour late.

So overall another brilliant trip!

Sri Lanka Day 18

A holiday from the holiday

Today was to travel up the the airport at Colombo for an overnight stay. It’s only about 3 hours away, so we were given the luxury of a morning off! We had a walk along the paradisiacal beach in the relative cool before the heat of the day, seeing a rather incongruous whimbrel on the way. After breakfast with most of the crowd we had an amazingly chilled morning. Lunch as usual then saying goodbye to Richard and Deborah who were going on a self organised 3 day beach holiday a bit up the coast. The remaining nine then got back in the bus for the final journey. This hotel though perfectly positioned and architecturally fine could really do with some tighter management. It’s also mostly used as an inclusive resort for people, mostly British but also others, who seem to eat, drink, sit in the pool and get very red in the sun. Mostly they didn’t seem overly healthy from the lifestyle.

The route north was mostly on the one and only motorway, which is a toll road and not much used. There wasn’t so much to see, a lot of agriculture and a few birds.

The hotel destination was plate glass and very smart. Frequented by a lot of airline staff and all rather nice, in surprisingly large gardens.

We had a couple of hours free and made use of the happy hour to have cocktails

Mukesh and Saman hadn’t quite finished with us as they knew owls frequented the garden and at 7pm, armed with a torch we spotted a brown hawk-owl

An excellent buffet dinner and bed.

Sri Lanka Day 17

Rinse (in the Indian Ocean) and repeat

A second day of whale watching with the first half identical to yesterday but with more idea what was likely to happen and somehow less hectic because we were hardened seafarers and knew what to expect. It was a rerun without a whale sighting but with some added bottlenose dolphins for the list. Although seemingly less choppy than yesterday several more people were decidedly ill. We were both fine, although Peg has suffered in the past 2 Stugeron seemed to work wonders.

On the way back from Mirissa we stopped briefly on the scenic coast to check out the fresh fish sales. This part of coast is attractive and easy to see easy to see that it’s become a destination.

All caught locally on that morning and they will cook it on the spot.

We then had a couple of hours free, in which Peg also braved the waves of the Indian Ocean. It was rougher today and I lost my goggles to them.

At 3pm we drove a relatively short way to a wetland area for a very productive session of birding, over 30 species in a couple of hours including yellow and black bittern.

And so to checklist, dinner and bed. These days are long with 5am starts becoming the norm.

Sri Lanka Day 16

Whales not so ahoy

We had signed up for this extension partly to avoid the dislocation of one minute tropical rainforest full on birding, next minute freezing London but also partly because it’s reputed to be the best place to see blue whales in the world. However, unlike for some people on the trip it wasn’t designed to be the highlight and we had also heard that recent changes to weather and shipping meant that the whales were more on the east side of the island. Nevertheless an interesting experience.

We had the, by now usual, pre-dawn, pre-breakfast start in order to bag some seats on the boats which were at Marissa, about 40 mins south. It seems some money had changed hands and a set of seats just ‘happened’ to have large cushions blocking them until we arrived although the boat was already ¾ full at 6.15am for a 7am start. The boats are two decks, take about 80 people. This is the most touristy area we have visited but still pretty low key compared with many places. Almost all low rise, partly with a surf vibe with only one hideously out of place partly constructed massive hotel, which smacked of corruption. There are quite a few east Asians, a few local or Indian tourists and maybe 30-50% European.

We set off promptly with a youngish captain in tee shirt, baseball cap and curly hair in a pigtail, cool. Checking on Google we went out about 5km then south parallel to the coast for about 10km, past the southern most point of Sri Lanka at about 5°N 80°E, and then made for home.

We saw on the way, first mating Olive Ridley turtles, they have to stay on the surface while mating, which looks even more awkward than most mating animals, then spinner dolphins. We saw upwards of a hundred of these small dolphins, being active and a few leaping out of the water and spinning, hence the name. On the journey south we were clearly looking out for whales, “we” being principally the captain, his 3 helpers and our two guides. As usual our group stood out by all having binoculars at all times like badges of honour and wearing full length clothes, unlike many others.

Whilst relatively calm there was quite a swell and the boat wasn’t particularly stable so some people, though not amongst our party, were quite sick. It was most fun to stand up and “ride” the deck as it moved and Peg and I did this mostly. This turned out to be a good move because towards the end of the drift south there was sudden excitement as three ‘humpbacked’ whales (later corrected to Fin whale, a lifer) were spotted forward in the distance. Only people like us already standing near the front really got a sighting. We saw massive tail fins breaking the water and splashing down, moving faster than the boat and thus escaping. The view at about 500m was distant but distinct but only 3 or 4 of us got to see it.

We then made our way back to port, the bus and lunch at the hotel. As usual that wasn’t the end of proceedings though. After lunch we had a trip north to the old fort town of Galle, stopping at a turtle rehabilitation and hatchery place on the way. Here a young lad gave a fascinating and well judged talk about the 5 of the 8 total sea turtle species found around here, showed examples of each in tanks recuperating from various injuries (including being fitted with artificial limbs!) and finishing with the hatchery where they increase the survival from sand to sea from 2% to 75%. They don’t plonk them in the sea as apparently they need to get their bearings from crawling towards the sea. They’ve hatched over 40,000 so far.

Not a cemetery but hatchery!

Continuing up the coast to Galle (pronounced Gaul) we had a walk round this pretty and interesting town. Originally a Portuguese fort, later expanded and built out by the Dutch and finally the English it had a colonial air but distinctly Dutch architecture. The centre was now narrow streets with tourist shops but actually relatively up market and the edge was the ramparts looking out to see and apparently a spectacular sunset but not today. As usual Mukesh was running us late and we only had 30mins on our own to explore.

Then home for dinner and bed

Sri Lanka Day 15

Garden of delight(ful endemics)

Another pre-breakfast start, these trips are a strange mixture of high luxury and mollycoddling mixed with fairly brutal schedules with some physical challenges.

Today’s first challenge was another very bumpy 4km up a track to a place described as a private garden. In reality a poor smallholder and his family with a yard that merged imperceptibly with the jungle.

We were supposed to eat the packed breakfast there but in fact the birding was good including needing to stay quiet and observe secretive birds on the ground. In the end we saw three endemics after patient waiting for an hour or so. The way the people live was also interesting. In general people seem to keep quite bare open rooms for multiple purposes. The kitchen had an open fire, various home made things around. They had a motorbike for transport, which seems common here but riding pillion over that road would be tough!

We returned for lunch. We were a party of 16 but at this point 5 people and a guide were leaving and 11 were continuing for the “blue whales extension”. Of the 5, 3 were going home the next day and two were having a two night extension at a beach resort. As a group I think we have gelled the best of any of the six trips we have been on, with no one standing out as a pain, except possibly us, and really friendly relaxed relations with everyone. Mukesh gave an end of trip spiel and we tipped Pradeep and the driver and his mate.

We then had a pretty direct drive to our next and final destination, Koggala, down on the coast, south of Galle. This was uneventful but interesting, with the only stop being at a service station on the only motorway here. Not dissimilar to ours with lots of similar food outlets and a seating area. The only difference being the 35° and close to 100% humidity!

The hotel turns out to be perfectly located right on a fantastic beach. Perfect sand, sloping at a good angle, breakers, palm trees the lot. I couldn’t resist a quick dip in the warmest ocean water I’ve experienced but quite powerful waves. It was apparently badly affected by the tsunami in 2004 though there is no obvious sign now.

We had already done checklist at lunch so just dinner and bed.

Sri Lanka Day 14

Per ardua ad owls and frogmouths

Today was the last full day birding and was in the rainforest which is very productive and full of birds, and leeches 🙂☹️.

The problem is that the entrance is 5km up a really rough steep bouldery track.. We accordingly had a pre-dawn start, suitably attired, and got into 35 year old rickety small jeeps. Packed in tightly but this wasn’t a bad thing, as it stopped too much rattling around.

We stopped halfway, in a small tea plantation, as dawn rose to take in the birds and the atmosphere.

After 5km we stopped at the entrance gates and proceeded on foot for the rest of the morning. The birding was good, several endemics, a frogmouth (Google it, I’ll put my pic up later) , fish, lizards, butterflies etc. We stopped for packed lunch at the end of the trail then reversed, including a famous mixed flock movement.

A leech for those asking. I later got two on me. Painless and disease free.

Pitcher plant

Green lizard

We drove all the way back down, just as bumpy like a fairground ride, but rather than heading home we set off up another track in the jeeps. This was in search of one bird though, a pair of roosting serendib scops owl. These proved to be 50m up a very steep wet jungle slope. Peg and I were fine but it was at the boundary of possible for many. People were all good at lending hands and we all got to see the very sweet chestnut coloured owls. Picture later

On the way down we were told about picking the curly tops of one type of fern, as a vegetable and we later tried it at dinner

The major collection here is toddy, a sweet nectar from the flowers of a palm tree. Initially a slightly fermented sweet drink, boiled to make treacle which is served with their delicious curds, and later distilled to the spirit arrack. To collect they use impromptu ladders to scale to the top of the tree

Then home for checklist, dinner, collapse.

Sri Lanka Day 13

Reservoir Hogs

This was mostly a moving day but we started with an early morning safari. These are becoming routine now, clambering into Jeeps after a bit of juggling for positions, drive to entrance, wait, start safari.

This park is based around a large reservoir and agricultural land claimed back for nature around it. The Udawalawe area is also home for Saman, the co leader and excellent birder. It’s best known for elephants but has plenty of birds and other animals.

The way gig trees grow

We saw a large group of wild boar go through, hence the title. I apologise that my punning hasn’t been up to scratch this trip but I’ve been tired and nursing a sore throat through much of it and creativity hasn’t been up there!

We also spotted leopard tracks on the way out, over our own, so fresh, so it is possible to see them here. We enjoyed ourselves but I do wonder what the majority of non birding tourists get from it, when one or two elephants is all there is to offer. As an aside it’s worth mentioning that many places around here have 10 ft high electric fences to keep elephants from crops and villages. Eating 200kg a day makes a big hole in a field!

We had lunch in the hotel with another surprisingly artistic fruit offering

I very much appreciate the cooking here, really flavoursome, spicy but not too hot, healthy feeling and somewhat varied.

We then had a three hour drive to the Sinharaja national park. We were to have two nights there, it’s reputed good for endemics of which Sri Lanka has 34.

The drive was over some great scenery with hairy zig zags, steep valleys, trees, schools, villages etc. School is from 7.30 to 13.30, they wear uniform, mostly white, dresses for girls, shorts then long trousers for boys. Everyone seems friendly and relatively happy, jokes , laughter etc. The usual buildings needing tlc opening straight onto the street, markets, tyre shops, medical facilities… All randomly appearing in a line. Buildings often on a narrow plot to the road but 3 or 4 stories high. I’m still not blasé about travelling, I hope you can tell.

We eventually arrived at the Blue Magpie lodge for the next two nights. This was way less swanky than many of the others but very likeable. Run by an older bloke, I think for many years, originally with only generator electricity. Simple rooms, simpler offering for food but in a great location and really friendly. We spent the remaining daylight birding from the open dining room/lounge area, then checklist, dinner and bed before another 5am start

Sri Lanka Day 12

Long toed stint without the crowds

A day of moving north, with an early start and packed breakfast. First stop Bundala national park, down near the coast with lagoons. Before that though we stopped to “twitch” a yellow bittern and long toed stint. The latter was the bird we twitched along with 2,000 others near Leeds.

Today

The National Park was visited by the, by now usual method of transferring to Jeeps. Slightly fraught trying to be reasonable but also get a good seat and guide as much as possible!

The park wasn’t as great as some of the others, though new birds were seen and interesting areas explored. We did have quite a good sighting of a golden jackal, which was new.

We then drove up to the next hotel near the Udawalawe national park, for lunch and evening birding. This hotel was also smart, though slightly fading, it once hosted the Wessex’s apparently. The park is well known for elephants and we saw several on the road, behind electric fences. They try to keep wild elephants separate from farms by 12ft high electric fences. Apparently elephants have learned how to deal with them in various cunning ways, including dumping a tree on them. Apparently 300 in total in this park. The evening birding was a gentle walk down to the reservoir which forms the centre of the park.

A gentle day so maybe a good time to mention the people and culture. We have been struck by how different the society is to Rajasthan. Though by no means rich, and still beset by economic problems, we have seen much less evidence of inequality. People seem to be living decently and happily. There is a lot of laughter, men and women appear quite equal, women are not wearing head dresses or hiding away. Kids wear good clean uniforms. There are not many private cars but a lot of motorbikes and buses. English isn’t widely spoken. Buddhism and Hinduism appear to exist happily together, give or take the odd civil war… The landscapes are green, lush, interesting. Food is spicy and very tasty. I like the place.

Sri Lanka Day 11

The elephant in the room

The relentless fun continues, with packed breakfast and leaving hotel at 5.30am in safari jeeps, to get to the gates for 6am. The difference being that this time there were upwards of a hundred jeeps waiting! Obviously a ‘gramable’ activity.

The guides obviously know this and plan the quieter day first. There’s no chance of seeing a leopard under these circumstances so we hang back and take in the birds, landscape and other wildlife. The birds are really great, the lighting was lovely and a great time was had. One highlight was a young elephant, left by its mother but learning how to survive

We stopped for breakfast when we met the beach.

On the return journey we had the fascinating story from Pradeep about the tsunami of 2004 which killed 40,000 Sri Lankans. He was guiding on this patch when it happened, managed to climb a tree and watch it come and go. Terrifying to be shown the actual trees and imagine it. On the way out we had the rather comical situation of stopping to get a picture of a black headed ibis, getting really involved and failing the see the massive bull elephant emerging and coming across the pool towards us. The guide and driver found our lack of seeing “the elephant in the room” hilarious.

I forgot to mention in this blog that we had another very lucky view of a large female leopard padding across the road about 50m ahead of us. I don’t think many others of the 100s of vehicles were so lucky.

We had an excellent lunch in the hotel, tried out the swimming pool, including Peg, and at 4pm had a stroll around the gardens and ‘tank’for birding finishing at the beach with the amusing warning signs below.

After the check list and dinner we retired to pack for  yet another early start.

Sri Lanka Day 10

The day of the leopard

Again a very early start in order to be at the gates of the national park, about an hour away, for the 6am opening time. This time we were also checking out so had to have bags outside rooms at 5.15am, and a packed breakfast. You sometimes have to rebound yourself that these are expensive holidays and not boot camps, though the very fancy accommodation helps to remind you.

So we left Tissamaharama for the Galge gate of the Yala national park. This park is vast and divided into sectors. The Yala entrance, for tomorrow, is rather touristy and on the Instagram trail, this entrance was quiet, we had three safari jeeps for our 16 and there were maybe 6 other Jeeps in total.

We set off gently looking at birds in either side after a bit of negotiation about seating. There are three rows of seats, high up and not easy to clamber into, with various plus and minus points to being at the front (good views all round and close to the guide but rather exposed to the sun and cramped legs), the back row (good high up views, more shade but further from guide and some directions obscured), middle back (shit views but lots of leg room).

In the middle of birding the driver took off further down the road. Hardened professionals like us know what this means, a big cat sighting. It turned out a leopard had been seen here earlier. We hung around for a while and were rewarded with a good view of a male leopard, resting in a grassy glade about 100m away! We watched for maybe 10 mins, when it stood up and prowled a little for settling out of view. Leopards are much harder than tigers to find and see and to have had a good view within the first 30 mins of 2 days of safari really took the pressure off!

Apologies for the quality of this picture off the back of my camera, I’ll play with technology later.

There were spotted deer surprisingly nearby but they make a lot of noise the moment he stood up.

We then spent the rest of the day touring around the area. We aren’t allowed out of the vehicles except for one small area we stopped for lunch. There is a rule that no one moves in the park between 12 and 2pm and it’s anyway bloody hot and humid at that time. Part of the reserve is a massive reservoir with dead trees sticking out. There are other water courses and lots of forest and we saw lots of birds, wild water buffalo, wild boar,mongoose, crocodiles and assorted other wild life.

The day was topped off by a lovely sighting of elephants grazing in the evening light.

An old female elephant

We then had a 90min drive, mostly in the dark, to the next, and swankiest, hotel Cinnamon Wild, near the main Yala gate.

This hotel was arranged in lodges, the food selection was amazing, good pool, great service etc. Highly recommended.