Overall summary

Important note about access to the posts:  to access the chronological part of this blog either go to 

• the bottom of this first page and click on "older posts' or
• the Archive on the RHS of any page, click on 'March' (which is when I set the pages up) and you will see inter alia a post for each day we were away.

This was a very enjoyable trip.  I would certainly recommend Jetwing to anyone contemplating a similar - or in fact any - trip to Sri Lanka.  I may add further to this post as I go through reacting to comments (very few thus far) and inserting additional images etc.

Most of the images were taken by me, but I have inserted some by Frances and  Rob/Carol in places where they add to the narrative.

Initial planning

The genesis for this exodus was a Christmas 2009 present from Frances in the form of a book covering the 100 best birding sites in the world by Dominic Couzens. We have visited 12 of the sites and (as she intended) I stared pondering which others needed a visit.  I was still feeling opposed to very long (ie more than about 15 hours) plane flights after the massive tiredness from our straight through flight from the UK which suggested somewhere in Asia was the go.

The entry for Sinharaja Forest in Sri Lanka looked rather interesting.  It was ranked #17 with the big attraction being very diverse mixed flocks. I liked the idea of getting a whole lot of ticks in one place.  Frances had also read somewhere about the excellent gardens in Sri Lanka so we seemed to have a definite combined interest.

A visit to Google for Bird tours Sri Lanka was the next effort.  This got me to a consolidator site who, as is the nature of such things bounced me on one of their 'operatives'.  This was Jetwing tours who, to my surprise got back to me within about 6 hours with a very pleasant communication.  They advertise in "British Birds' so were obviously not a total owl (ie fly-by-night) company.

A friend in the UK suggested another company to look at.  They were also very responsive to my approach and were headed up by Sri Lankas leading birder. 

I then started some reading, with an out of date copy of the Lonely Planet guide.  Looking at the places they recommended (other than the beach resorts which have no interest for me) gave me a good list of places.

Of course I also scanned the DFAT travel advisory for the country.  I was particularly taken by this comment

"The safety standards you might expect of transport and tour operators, including adventure and water sport activities, are not always met."

The safety standards I expect in such a country - or indeed from tour operators in any country -  are very skimpy so I expect they will be well met.

We decided that it might be nice to have some friends travel with us and floated the idea with a number of them.  One couple- Rob and Carol - have decided to join in.  This also defined our starting period: it seemed important to do the trip in April before all the migrants head off back to the North, and the male half of this couple has an appointment with a marathon in Canberra on 15 April.  So we are leaving on the 16th: this means Rob has chosen an aisle seat as he reckons he might have trouble climbing over people after six hours in an aircraft seat!

After some discussion of alternatives it seemed that both companies we were looking at went to similar places but the Jetwing team were more generalists while the alternative were more full-on birders.  Given that 3 of the 4 people in our group were non-twitchers the generalists seemed to be the choice and got the tick.  They were then very good about waiting a few weeks (OK, months) while we sorted out details at our end of the arrangement.

Payment of the deposit went very smoothly - mainly because after our trip to the UK I realised that the Westpac site was full of bull**it and all one really needed was an account number and a Swift code.  The arrangements for making the final payment were very civilised and the timing was determined by when we thought the Ocker had peaked against the Greenback.  (It did go up a bit more but then started dropping again, so we didn't do as bad as we have often done in trying to win on currency!)

April 26: Back to the High country

Morning birding at Kelani Valley Forest Reserve. which is a lowland tropical rainforest rich in endemic fauna and flora. The Kelani Valley Forest Reserve is ideal for any missed lowland endemics such as Sri Lanka Myna, Green-billed Coucal, Spot-winged Thrush, Sri Lanka Blue Magpie, Sri Lanka Spurfowl, Brown-capped Babbler and Red-faced Malkoha. Afternoon, leave for Chaaya Citadel, Kandy for two nights. 

We revised our schedule a bit so that we revisited the place near the nick again.  Before departing on that we got excellent views of a flock of Sri Lankan Grey Hornbills around the Guest House.  On getting to the police station area we again failed to find the Owlet. 

So back to the Guest House to try for the Serendib Scops Owl in the rain forest fragment on the opposite side of the river.  This involved a ride in a dugout Canoe,

 in which Hettie – like most Sri Lankans that we saw – stood up while I at least squatted down to get better balance and Rob took photos.  We then did a very brisk walk, pausing only to look at another Green Forest lizard

and some Mimosa flowers (plus play a little with their sensitive leaves)

then on up through a picturesque village

and into the rain forest.

 After a very pleasant walk we came to a stream which was flowing a lot more strongly than usually encountered, due to the recent rains.  Frances and Carol decided to wait while Hettie Rob and myself got our feet wet.  After a few more metres we came to a paddy field and observed some hawk eagles but nothing else.  Hettie looked under a little farmers shelter into the forest (after checking the shelter for snakes) but no owl,  so along the edge of the field and back into the rainforest on a track.  After about 2 minutes Hettie decided that we should return but he would dive into the forest on a very narrow track to do one more playback.  We were to wait in the shelter.

As he disappeared Rob said “Should we have asked him to leave the car keys?”.  We heard a bit of playback and shortly after Hettie emerged moving reasonably swiftly but not looking overjoyed so we guessed the owl was AWOL.  His first words were “I have been bitten by a snake.”.  The immediate question from us was “Is it poisonous?” to which the unwished-for positive answer, was given.

Hettie was firm that despite Australian practise he would walk back – probably good as he is a big lad and we couldn't carry him - so set off using his mobile phone.  (NOTE to TELSTRA and OPTUS:  the mobile phone got coverage in a bloody jungle some distance from a village, let alone a Provincial capital: why can't you do the same?)  The idea seemed to be to take some analgesics; wash the wound; apply some leaves; and get to hospital asap.  As he was allergic to aspirin it was good that Frances had some paracetamol.  By the time we got across the river his brother had contacted the Guest House and he was met by 8 concerned staff and taken off to hospital. 

The manager assured us that the species was not very venomous and that if your time was managed well “you'll be in Heaven.”  I said something to the effect that Heaven was not where we wanted him to be, and after a pause the manager understood my joke and roared with laughter.  The next step was Hettie calling the manager to say that he would be in the hospital for 4 hours but Jetwing were sending another chauffeur as he might not be able to drive.

We basically hung out in the Guest House.  This was aided by having a beer (surprisingly they still had some) and taking a few images.  Some of them are in the Birds page and here are a few others.

The red stems on some palms were attractive.

 A red stain on my shirt was less so: here is the culprit (one of two)

 A view from further back

This White-throated Kingfisher gave a beetle a thorough hammering on the railings before finally swallowing it.  (By this stage we were feeling a tad hammered ourselves.)

After a few hours Hettie rang again to say he was being kept in for 12 hours, the new driver would be with us in 20 minutes and another guide would join us in the morning.  He hoped to join up before we left the country.

So the new driver Bundulu arrived, we loaded up the kit and took off.  Giving due credit, the staff of the Guest House had been very considerate, both to Hettie and ourselves - although we were hours late checking out they made no fuss and produced a cellphone whenever Hettie rang.

Bundulu was not a slow driver like Hettie (he wasn't paid to look for birds we passed etc, but to get clients from Point A to somewhere else, such as Point B) but didn't do daft things.  As we left Kitulgala I noticed a sign on the road pointing to the site where the Bridge on the River Kwai was filmed, but in the circumstances didn't request a stop!

We dodged some potential points of congestion such as a rainy village market

and our first Sri Lankan accident scene where a ute and a bus appeared to have had a misunderstanding.  As there where a few cops on the scene, and we crossed a few ambulances headed to the scene, it may have been nasty.

Gampola Railway Station was straight out of the Raj and/or Bollywood! We got to Kandy in 90 minutes rather than 150 and checked into the Citadel.  Very, very plush and an excellent view across the river.

The place was well endowed with tour groups, some of whom were very noisy.  When we went down for tea there was music from the bar echoing up and competing with the foul musak in the restaurant.  The food however was good.

Bird of the day:  Grey Hornbill

Other vertebrate of the day:  Palm squirrel (the most obvious candidate was seen by none of us)

Pattern of the day:  Elephant designs

Bad taste of the day:  Quebecois tourists  who let their brats sit on the counter of the food service area.

Big Positive  of the day:  Behaviour of the Guest House staff and Jetwing office folk to get us out of the doo-doo!

Addendum from the future: I was at a COG Meeting in mid-June and chatted with another member who visited Sri Lanka a couple of years ago.  They used the Bird and Wildlife mob and it seemed a very intense trip.  They got all the endemics, including the Serendib Scops Owl  This was at Kithulgala and in the jungle, so only 2 people were allowed in to look at once.  Thus I suspect it was the infamous area behind the small hut. One couple went to look from a different angle and were startled - at least - to find a cobra dangling off a branch about a foot from their faces!

Read on