It was end of 2010 and we went to visit Kataragama for few days (Five Days). This Ranminithanna visit is the main part of the our trip. We started the our journey from kataragama around 8.00am. it will take 30min from k’gama bus stand to main road entrance of the park and other part(main road to park entrance)will take around 30min by walking.

Our first stop was at Kochchikade for our breakfast. After the breakfast we drove through Chillaw to Mundalama till we got to know that we missed Anavilundawa junction, and return to Anavilundawa and turn to right (from Colombo to puttalm you have to turn left) at Anavilndawa junction, Nalladaran kattuwa,that was just few meters before 90 km post. Any way we arrived to sanctuary at 9.00 A.M. That may be little late for bird watching any way we were lucky to watch lot of birds.

Afterwards we proceeded to Hunnasgiriya Town, from where we took the road to Loolwatta. The Deanston Conservation Centre is located about 8km away on this road.

The place is accessible by bus. To reach Hunnasgiriya either the Colombo to Kandy, Kandy to Mahiyangana bus combination or the Colombo to Mahiyangana bus should be taken. After getting down at Hunnasgiriya 616 Hunnasgiriya – Loolwatta bus must be taken. However this bus only operates. It leaves the Teldeniya depot at 12.30pm each day (Information can be obtained by calling the teldeniya depot).

We entered the park around 2.30 pm and was lucky to get Saranga as the tracker(He was our tracker on our trip to Kebilitta in 2008). We told him that our priority was to see the Leopard and then Birds and may be a tusker as My wife and daughter were more in to animals than birds. During the period of 3 hours in the park we were able to see the Leopard , a tusker and a few birds and the photo session was pretty good because of the superb lighting.

As a travel location; Devon was the first in our journey. 97m height water fall was identified as one of the 20 most spectacular waterfalls in Sri Lanka. It was located at a distance of 7km from Talawakele. There were two main view points located at A7. One was closed to Mlesna tea castle. The other was the lower one which was special because the both Devon & St. Claire falls can be viewed at the same place.

As per the legend, Panduwasnuwara was formally known as “Upathissa Pura”. When the King Panduwasdew came to the throne & made his capital there, this was renamed as Panduwasnuwara. The king Panduwasdw was a nephew of the King Wijaya & been the second king in our Rajawaliya. And he was the grand father of the King Pandukabhaya, the first Sri Lankan King. When the King Pandukabhaya won the throne, he made Anuradhapura as his capital & forgot his birth place which was not given shelter for him even for a day from his childhood. As a result Panduwasnuwara, the capital for 51 years of the country was neglected for 100 years.

Our journey started from around 4.30 in the morning and we proceeded to Rathnapura where had the breakfast. After the breakfast we went to the Rathnapura Maha Saman Dewalaya. We spent a little time there and hit a road again. We went along A4 highway until we came to the Kalupahana junction and took a left turn towards the Bamabarakanda. After proceeding about 4.5 km we had the 1st sight of the Bambarakanda fall at a distance.

A 3 day visit to southwestern part of Sinharaja, called morningside due to its weather is always feels like morning
Harsha and myself (iro)(left Colombo around 6.00 am by a CTB bus to Ambilipitiya (through low level road – Try to use bus through low level since it is 10 Kms shorter than high level). We reached Rathnapura at about 8.20 am and met Kavinda (other member of the group). Then we had our breakfast and we bought some rice. kavinda already bought other stuff for cooking.

We reached Thalgasmankada Bungalow at around 2.30 p.m. We learnt that we were the first party to stay there after it was closed about two years back following an LTTE attack on the army camp which used to be there in front of the bungalow. Until lunch was ready, we walked around the bungalow and spent some time at the river which was almost overflowing.

We started around 6.00 am from Gampaha and stopped at Rathanapura and had the breakfast. Then we proceeded towards Udawalawa and reached Udawalawa bungalow around 1.30 pm. While passing Udawalawa park we saw few elephants inside the fence, just by the side of Udawalawa road. These elephants have got used to come up to this point as visitors feed them with fruits. There are signboards saying ‘Do not feed animals’ but visitors don’t adhere to these instructions.

We continued on this towards Verugal, hardly any traffic, people or shops on this route. Good idea to have plenty of drinking water, juice, fresh fruits to quench your thirst because one can drink a lot. As it’s hot and humid in this part of no mans land. Sri Lanka has the natural beauty no matter, wherever you may travel and this Mutur – Verugal route is no exception. Continuing along the way enjoy the scenery, assortment of scrubland, marshes, forest patches, rocks, Palmyra groves, reservoir, streams and the lush green vegetation with herds of feeding cattle, displaying a unique beauty of its own.

If I explain to you the very little I know about the devalaya, this place is considered very sacred by devotees of God Katharagama . They believe that the God’s present staying place is the ‘Maha Siyambalawa Devalaya’ (Kebaliththa). I’m too believe that without any doubt. There are so many ‘Haskam’ which I cannot explain here. People at Kotiyagala respect this place very strongly and they are even scared to deal with this place. So I listened to their word and prepared my self as per the customs which they told that we have to follow.