The best time to visit these parks is during the drought season during July to September but usually yala is closed for visitors during the month of September so I thought of doing this trip on late August but then again when I checked with my contacts @ yala I came to know that this time the park will remain open so shifted my plans to September where the affects of the drought is much more severe so our chances of sighting leopards is @ high.

We left Colombo around 4.30 in the morning. The crew was three people in a Mitsubishi Pejero. I was the one behind the wheel and picked up my friends from their places and we started our journey.

The initial drive was bit difficult since it was a long weekend, most of the people were going out and all the vehicles were in a bunch and adding to it, there was a slight drizzle as well so had to put an effort to break free from the pack.

After breaking free from the pack it was brisk cruise up to Udawalawe and I got our breakfast packed in to individual containers so we had it while on the move and were able to save some time.

The Walawe reservoir had very little water compared with its capacity and there were lots of eagles around flying parallel to the road but unfortunately I wanted to have my breakfast before we enter the park so couldn’t take any pictures.

We reached udawalawe park entrances around 7.30 Am. Got our permits and rushed in and this guy was there to welcome us.

The crew @ Udawalawe park office

Near the Udawalawe park entrance

Then we drove along some distance and came across a herd of elephants and 3 of them were in a playful mode running all over the place chasing one another

The three playful elephants

This one was in bit of a threatening mood

Closeup!

Then we moved to Muwan-palassa and there were 50-60 elephants belonging to several herds. We spend something like 45 min observing their behavior.

In the meantime one of my colleague called one of his friends (who is an animal lover as well) and teased him saying the number of elephants around and so on and he inquired about our plans as well. Within the next fifteen minutes we got a call from our friend saying “he’s leaving Colombo now and will be joining us @ yala”

@ Muwan-palassa
	Mother and the calf

Sand Spray!

Our guys wanted to have a river bath so we went to Pransa dara camp site leaving all the elephants @ Muwan palassa and spent one hour or so @ Walawe River where water level was very low and the water was bit chilly as well.

After that we covered some areas on our return and came out of the park and our destination was Kirinda.

Then on our way we had lunch @ Gami-gedara in Lunugamwehera and continued.

We reached the guesthouse around 2.45Pm, refreshed our self’s and were ready for the evening safari.

By that time our friends from Colombo have reached Tissa and there weren’t any available rooms in our guesthouse so they spend the night @ Sithulpahuwa and they weren’t able to join us for the evening safari.

Basically I have contacts in most of the national parks so I informed Kalum my guide back @ yala about our visit and he was calling me from the morning to check on us and I was taking back some leopard pictures which I took in my previous visit so he was eagerly waiting to see them.

So we rushed in to palatupana, got our permits done and kalum was waiting for us as expected and according to him large number of vehicles have made it into the park by that time so we had to expect some traffic jams as well.

We drove along and were able to hit the jackpot without much of a problem. There was a leopard going for the water hole so we watched it until it disappeared in to the wilderness and then turned back and raced away to Moda wala and parked my jeep in a good position so we won’t get disturbed by other jeeps and within 2-3 min the place was jam-packed with jeeps and eventually the leopard made its move.

Leopard approaching Moda-wala

Leopard drinking at Moda-wala

Leopard at Moda-wala

This is it for day 1 and we moved out from the park.

Usually I like to drive @ night on Sithulpahuwa road and @ times I have spotted sloth bears at night on this road. So we went to visit our friend from Colombo who is spending the night there but we drove up to Sithulpahuwa without any luck.

Met our friend and shared our pictures with his family and agreed to meet upon @ Palatupana for the morning safari.

Then I just wanted to check whether Gamunu is around or not and he was there standing right next to the gate so I approached him with caution then he moved in front of us gave us a little demonstration and left.

Then we return to our guest house and our friend joined us up to magul maha viharaya but we couldn’t spot anything.

On day 2 we made it early into the park and our friend and his family joined us with their Land cruiser. We checked few places frequent by leopard and @ palugaswala No 2, monkeys were gone wild and when we observed it closely and saw a leopard walking through the scrub and I backed up a bit and there was another one but unfortunately they were on the move through the scrub and I was driving so couldn’t take any pictures so we stayed there for some time hoping they would return to the water hole, but in wane.

We had our breakfast @ parana thotupola and spend some time relaxing there because we were on a full day safari.

A small hike to Kosgasmankada campsite

Then we checked some more waterholes and in fact spend hours parking near some of them hoping for a sighting. Then we had our lunch @ patanangala beach and spent some time there until we start our evening session.

Lunch time @ Patanagala beach

On the main road a leopard crossed and vanished into the scrub making our total sighting of leopards up to 4.

some pics from Buthawa wewa

some pics from Buthawa wewa

some pics from Buthawa wewa

On the 3rd day prior to our return we went back to magul maha viharaya & Sithulpahuwa to meet up with my friends there and were lucky enough catch up with Arjuna as well. Usually he roams around Katagamuwa, Heenwewa and Sithulpahuwa areas.

We were lucky enough catch up with "Arjuna"

"Arjuna" the tusker

Then we returned to Colombo