When we woke up in the morning, rain had stopped completely. The sky was cloudy but it was not all gloomy. It is under these conditions that we set off for the 8th consecutive day on bikes. From Makulpotha-Thalwehera we turned right towards Hakwetuna Oya reservoir with the objective of cutting across the country side to reach Galtenwewa Junction.

Remaining distance to Kandhakuli from our unplanned night park yesterday was 80km. Even though 80km was a bit of stretch to cycle in a single day, we decided that there is no point in breaking the journey for another day. So we were determined to do the full stretch in a day.

We set out of Colombo at about 5.00amin the morning and traveled via Ratnapura, Balangoda A4 road and at the 151 Km post the road to Uggal Aluthnuwara is on the right side of the road marked by a Thorana still incomplete. Nine KMs from Balangoda towards Badulla. Passing the thorana travel about 450meters and turn right and then proceed about 150 meters and come to the site of the magnificent dewalaya.

We started the trip by 4.30am by 2 4X4 from Colombo. But due to heavy rain on last few days we got news as many roads were under water but we just went ahead with our plan decided not to have a route plan. We had everything for three but we carried drinking water and things need for a BBQ dinner.

We started our journey from 4th mile post of Trinco and our first place was Welgam Wehera temple. According to the map we have to first go to Anuradhapura junction and then travel in Trinco- Anuradhapura road (A12) towards Anuradhapura to reach this temple. But we bypassed the Anuradhapura junction and followed a short cut to come to A12 road.

My objective of this journey was to visit at important historical places in Ibbagamuwa-Madagalla(මඩගල්ල) road. (B62 ) As usual I started the journey in the early morning. We came to Ibbagamuwa around 7.00am and got a bus towards Madagalla. Our first place was Arankale (අරන්කැලේ) ruins and got down in front of Archeology board. From there it was about 3km towards Arankale. Therefore we got a three-wheeler to travel.

While I was at Buddama i got a wonderful opportunity to visit some ancient places which were hardly known by the public. So one day I got together with Nishantha and decided to visit few places. We arrived at the 2nd mile post junction on Siyambalanduwa-Ampara road and took the road towards the Degal hela mountain and after passing few km’s we reached the ancient unoccupied temple at the base of the mountain.

I spent the last few days of December at Yala as usual. We experienced more rain this time around (22-28th Dec) compared to last few years similar time, but no complains. We had a few very good sightings, but nothing to beat this bull elephant episode. Hope these selected photos and my little captions tell the story. This lasted for about twenty minutes.

This was one of those journeys I did few months a back while intending to visit some unheard rarely visited places but yet archeologically significant. Actually most of these places are within 20Km’s to my resting place so on a day with a clear sky I departed towards Dambagalla and proceeded towards Mari Arawa. I had to get down at Meegahapitiya to pay a visit to the ancient temple of Meegahapitiya.

Wilpattu has always been on our wish list, more so after reading Nihal de Silva’s The Road to Elephant Pass. Even though the park was reopened in 2009, we were not able to go that way due to many constraints. The wish finally became a reality only in December 2012.

Since I landed at Iginiyagala I have noted one abnormal dome shape rock close to Pallan oya and one day while I was wondering around the dam of Senanayake reservoir I asked a school boy about this rock and he said to me “ඕක උඩ නටබුන් තියෙනව සද්ධාතිස්ස රජ දවසෙ කරවපු” which lit a bulb in my brain matter and the next thing he said is that he has a friend who knows in and out about this rock.

It was Friday the 16th March. We set of at around 4 a.m. from Moratuwa on a three day excursion to Galoya National Park. Shahan had booked the Mahadorowwa camp site on the Nilgala side of the park. We were a crew of 12 in three vehicles.