Yala Safari Park

A trip to Sri Lanka is not complete if you don’t do a safari in one of the numerous National Parks.
We decided to do a full day trip into the Yala National Park. We stayed 2 nights in the Hotel River Front in Debarawewa, around 35 Mins away from the main gate. Very clean hotel with good service.
So the tour did start 4.30am and we were back in the hotel around 6pm. In between was a 2.5h lunch break where no car is allowed to drive in the park. The location for the lunch was next to the beach as the National Park has the beach in one side. A wonderful setup and we enjoyed the hour sitting in the beach just watching out. This area got also hit by the tsunami in 2004. 250 people died here but no animal (instincts!). The park itself has a size of 979 sqm. It was designated as a wildlife sanctuary already in 1900. It consists of 5 blocks and we explored block 1 (Palatupana).
We saw Elephants, loads of different Birds (like Little Green Bee Eater), Black a necked Storks, Lizards (Land Monitor), Crocodiles, Wild Water Buffalos, Axis Deers, Sambar Deer, Wild Boar, Grey Langurs, India Peafowls, Ceylon Jungle Fowl. The leopards we only saw from the far distance. Better to see them during the dry period when they need to find water.
The afternoon was full of rain and we experienced the second part of the heavily bumpy roads in the National Park.Read more