April 17 Recovery and acclimatisation

Morning, relaxation. Afternoon, visit Talangama Tank to look for birds.

We met our guide (who we call, at his request, Hettie – rather than use his family name Suchithra as advised by Jetwing) after getting the money and joined the chaos in the pick up area while he got the Jetwing van. We then had an hour of touring from 35km N of Colombo through the city and then 15 km east. On route we noticed:

• Many statues of Buddha, many with flashing blue and red LEDs forming a halo around the head;
• Lots of turf accountant premises. The first three had police stations opposite which we thought might be a pattern, but then the bookies continued and the copshops disappeared;
• it was raining and most people carried brollies (even the cops in uniform).
• There were lots of cattle wandering around and at one point a dozen of them loomed up like the zombies in a Living Dead movie.

Then we got to Villa Talangama. Caesar Augustus would be jealous of a villa as great as this. It is a huge place with just us in it. The staff had stayed up until 2am to greet us, give us a juice and cart our kit around. Excellent. We agreed that breakfast would be at 10 am if we were up by then which we were. This was a huge meal of very healthy stuff served by the excellent staff. It was served under an umbrella beside the pool giving a view over thee Tank. We had a conversation with Hamish - the owner of the Villa - and made arrangements for tea at 7pm (we're going birding with Hettie at 3:30).  Here are a few images of the villa and its fittings (mainly taken by Frances).

 Hamish pointed out that we were lucky to have arrived at 2am as the traditional song festival 50m away had only finished at 1:30am. This was part of the New Years Festivities (which seem to last 5 days at least with New Years Day itself in the middle). Possibly lucky to find we could get rooms etc at this time.

Frances and I arose about 9:30 and were greeted with this view.

We all went for a prowl together (repeating more or less one which Rob and Carol had already done).  A good collection of reptiles were seen:

Land Monitor

 Water Monitor

Garden Lizard

Rob good an excellent image of a Dragonfly, which annoyed me for several minutes by refusing to pose!

Many birds seen, of which several were additions to my life list. My favourites of this stage were initially the White-bellied waterhens

with little fluffball black chicks (which didn't hang around to be photographed), but were overtaken by the Flamebacks- very lurid woodpeckers.  The Tank was a bit low on water, but high on birds as shown in this Rob image.

I then decided to go for a run to the wall of the Tank and perhaps a bit further. When I got about 1km from the Villa there was a lot of interesting stuff happening so I went back and got my camera.

The tractor driver wasn't real happy about having his photo taken even at 50m away. Then I saw the Pheasant-tailed jacanas

and I was a very happy chappy.  A cooling and cleansing dunk in the pool completed the business.

In the afternoon we went for a slightly longer walk with Hettie, where we saw very many birds and generally had an excellent time. Highlights were the whistling ducks and cinnamon bittern. As we had not used the car at all this was all able to be counted as Green Birding.  While relaxing from all this exercise a monkey

ran across the lawn, getting a very steely gaze from Hamish's dog.  (I cannot imagine the battles that would ensue between our small dog an monkeys!)

The evening meal was enlivened with a bottle of Merlot and was generally excellent. The main dish was fish (rated by Hamish as better than chicken - note from later in the trip: this opinion is strongly endorsed) and was accompanied by many tasty vegetables. Definitely a great meal.

Bird of the Day:  Black-rumped Flameback

Other vertebrate of the Day:  Garden lizard

Pattern of the day:  Wrought-iron Gates

Bad taste of the day: none.

Read on

 

April 21 Bundala and Yala

After breakfast leave for Yala Village, Yala for two nights. En route visit Bundala National Park in safari jeeps. Bundala is a fascinating wetland home for 150 species of winter migrant and resident birds. The park is accessed in safari jeeps. The highlight would be large flocks of Greater Flamingos, which could number up to a few hundred. Bundala is a ‘Ramsar’ wetland of Sri Lanka. Among the larger water birds you could also see Lesser Adjutant, Painted Stork, Asian Openbill, Eurasian Spoonbill, Black-headed Ibis and Woolly-necked Stork. Waders that can be seen at Bundala include Pacific Golden, Lesser Sand and Greater Sand, Little Ringed, Kentish and Little Ringed Plovers, Little Stint, Marsh, Common, Wood and Green Sandpipers. You could also see the two odd-looking Eurasian Thick-knee and Great Thick-knee in addition to Eurasian Curlew, Black tailed Godwit, Common Snipe, Red-necked Phalarope, Pintail Snipe and Ruddy Turnstone.

Over this day and the next there were a couple of references to the tsunami of 2004. These have been gathered together in a special page.

As a result of the soggy bit of 20 April and the forecast for the following day Hettie suggested that we slightly change the plan for Bundala and have an early start, visit the Park and then go on to Yala in the afternoon. We agreed quickly and were up and about at 5am.

This meant we left in the dark which made Hettie's headlights and alertness the things which avoided a very large tree which had fallen across the road. He also avoided all the dogs which were gathering in the middle of the road for a convivial sniff round. They seemed to be in larger numbers than usual and also much more alert.

In past blogs I have commented on aspects of technology which have passed some countries by. In the case of Sri Lanka it seems to be the dip switch, particularly on trucks. Tuk-tuks were around early with intersting lighting effects on occasion. Most of them are imported knocked down from India and assembled in Empipitlya while the Piaggio Ape models are imported fully assembled, but from India rather than Italy.

The area around Bundala is the least prosperous in the country and as a result the Government has been doing development projects. These include:

• an International airport (fair enough as there are nice beaches and Parks to attract punters);
• an International port (fair enough as there is a lot of passing shipping); and
• an International Convention Centre (never justified anywhere for any purpose).

There were also a lot of signs around covered with marketing spin and BS about “Empowering Youth” and similar meaningless phrases.

We met our driver and transferred to his jeep for the tour of Bundala NP - a RAMSAR Wetland of International importance site - getting into the Park just after daybreak. This was a brilliant idea as the light was crystal clear and there were lots and lots of birds around, as well as some other animals. Getting the others out of the way first:

• Grey Langurs – not Langers, Alfie hasn't aged than much;
  

  

  
  

  

  
  

  

   Black-necked Hares;
• Spotted deer; and
• Mugger Crocodiles.

The latter were in large numbers and some were large in size. A particularly active specimen had gone to sleep in the road, woke as we arrived on an elevated track through the salt fields and dived into the pan alongside.  Here is a shot of it before it climbed on to the road.

Rob got a better image of the beast

 The waterbirds were evident before we got to the Park itself - where no-one seemed to be on duty – but we wandered in and were soon seeing many birds. Grey-headed Fish-eagle was an initial highlight and then several grassland species were seen closely followed by a large colony of terns, with a few waders. Quite a few of the images are in the 'Birds' page but some tasters follow.

Purple Sunbird

 Reflected Pheasant-tailed jacana

 Greater Thick-knee

We dodged around on tracks that were partly submerged - thanks Rob

and came out on to some salt pans. These had a lot of water in them – rotten rain – which had reduced the number and variety of waders and water birds (for example we saw no gulls). After seeing a large crocodile inspecting a pipe between two lagoons (see mage above) we came across small flocks of Red-necked Phalarope ( which I hadn't seen since Ottawa 1991) and Small Pratincole (a lifer). At the end of this we had to return as we didn't have permission to use the private roads in the salt works.

I think we totalled up to 65 species in the park: a really good haul. The clear light certainly helped.

There was then a short drive to Yala, including a stop to look at the Pagoda on a site 2300 years old (the pagoda is more recent) on which the tooth relic was stored during part of its life. The wall around the site was decorated with elephant designs.
We stopped in this village to fill up with diesel and I took the opportunity to snap some of the locals filling up the fuel containers for their tractors etc.  We were quite intrigued as to how they rode the motor bikes wearing sarongs.

It was not uncommon the see someone topping up the fuel in a tuk-tuk from a 1.5l soda bottle.  One of the benefits of no power must be good economy!
We also met up with another bike race, but in more rural surroundings and with a clear leader so not so thrilling as the previous example. It was amusing to see the leader get a bucket of water heaved over him! (The lines in this image ae the heating elements in the rear window of the van.)

The road to the Yala Resort was ungood, taking about 45 minutes to cover about 12 kms. The Resort is excellent being only about 12 years old. Somehow it was not damaged by the tsunami although almost on the beach. I went for a short run around the resort (4 laps at 500m per lap) followed by a swim and a medicinal beer. There were not a huge number of flowers about - I suspect that happens during and after the monsoon - but these yellow blossoms were quite common.

 Note that we were not allowed to go beyond the boundary due to the risk of dangerous animals such as leopards and elephants (and possibly crocodiles which were quite visible in the lagoon next to the pool). A herd of wild boar -about 20 of all sizes – ran past our chalet just before we went to dinner.  The next evening Hettie's brother, also a Jetwing guide, saw a leopard from the Hotel.
 However we were allowed to go onto the beach.  This guy was fishing well out to sea with a very heavy swell running.  I would not have been out there in that boat in those conditions

This shot shows the length of the beach: the fishing boats enter at the far end.

Proving that the waves were quite strong ....

We couldn't resist this shot of a brain-like rock with shadows.

To justify the early start a large thunderstorm started just as dusk fell.

Dinner was buffet style and quite good, once we found the Sri Lankan curry section. A mild annoyance was the wine wallah almost demanding that we had wine rather than the beer which we ordered. We ignored him.

Bird of the Day: Chestnut-headed Bee-eater

Other vertebrate of the Day: Mugger crocodile

Pattern of the day: Elephant design at pagoda

Bad taste of the day: An embarrassment of choice in the attire of our fellow guests.

Read on  

April 24: Hortons Plains

Morning visit Horton Plains National Park to see Cloud Forests and rare montane fauna, which include the endemic Rhino-horned Lizard, which was featured in Charles Darwin's monumental work on evolution, Bear Monkey, Giant Squirrel and Sambhur. Walk though the grasslands and Cloud Forests to a popular viewpoint know as World's end, which is an escapement with a 870 m drop. We also look for endemic birds Yellow-eared Bulbul and Sri Lanka Hill White-eye and Dull blue Flycatcher. Afternoon visit Hakgala Botanical Gardens. Here we look for the highland races of Purple-faced Leaf Monkey and Toque Macaque. The Toques brim with self-confidence and may approach the visitors!

A very early start to get into Hortons Plains NP. Hettie and I were to do birding, while the others would go a little further in the van and then do a walk (9km round trip) to the World's End look down and some Falls. The road up was rather steep and twisty (and rough, so we didn't use the Jetwing van but a rented one).

The first wildlife spotted by Hettie and myself was a Giant Squirrel (these are big suckers: about the size of a Brush-tailed Possum not little cuties like the Palm and Dusky species).. The walkers also saw one some kms further on.

On the subject of Dusky Squirrels they were also plentiful:

 The key bird was the Sri Lanks Whistling Thrush. After about 30 minutes a fine male flew across the road in front of us, landed, and hammered a snail. Absolutely perfect views, lasting until 0.1 picoseconds before I had my camera set up!  After hanging about for a while longer trying for various other species (and scoring several including Crimson-backed Flameback and Yellow-eared Bulbul) we headed off to meet up with the van. The vegetation at this point was rather dense and rainforest like (possibly because it was rainforest albeit approaching the elfin forest in the higher parts of Peru).  Many epiphytes were available.!

When we got out into the plains proper there were many Pied Bushchats

around and fans of Sean Dooley will be pleased to know that the Zitting Cisticola was common.  In this area the only interruptions to the grass were occasional Rhodedendrons, with the first flowers starting to emerge.

At times the Plains are home to many Sambur deer.  We saw one cross the road and then came across this one sat beside the road.  It is a rather sad case who has earnt that it is easier too bum unhealthy food off visitors than to forage for itself.

We got to the van before the walkers returned so I wandered out to meet them. They had had some good views of "Worlds End" itself (these images by Frances)

 and on the track to Bakers Falls

as well as excitements including seeing a leopard pawprint followed by hearing a close coughing roar. It is interesting that in Yala the jeeps have to have a roof because of leopards but here people walk around!   Another sighting - of a Slow Worm pictured by Rob -

  has entered official mythology! There are of course a few signs around.

On the drive down I thought the Sri Lankan design of crash barrier was worth presenting.  In case you are wondering the drop on the other side is not sheer: no more than a 60% slope, possibly less than 100m vertical drop and no really big vehicles could use the road.

In the afternoon We went to some Botanic Gardens - rather more like an English municipal park than the ANBG – to have a final squizz for migrants (none) Bear-monkeys (we saw a large troupe of this race of the Purple-faced Leaf Monkey) and the Rhinoceros-lizard (2 were seen).

An unusual sight was what appeared to be dark concrete pipes enncasing some tree fern stems.  The whole thing may have been concrete: we never found out.

 As we entered we had noticed that some local youth were playing cricket, with the pitch running across the main road into town!   They had finished by the time left allowing me to concentrate on the more traditional, but probably less interesting, vegetable terraces

and surrounding mountains.

On the subject of mountains Nuwara Eliya is at about 2,000m and on the way out to Hortons Plains we passed the highest railway station with a sign citing 2,200m: the road went up considerably after that!  (As an aside, on the climb up to Nuwara Eliya I  had noticed a sign for one village quoting its elevation to the nearest millimetre.  This really baffled me, until Carol suggested that its height had probably been originally taken in feet and then converted, using a detailed factor, to metres: having got the answer to 3 decimal places why not use it?)

Our evening meal was a buffet and rated as best so far. The trifle was excellent and took me back to Sunday tea in my childhood! Equally the bread and butter pudding was fully authentic taking me back to one of the few diishes that was cooked to be edible at my school. Some dishes were done to order, including banana fritters (possibly not too healthy due to them being deep fried as you wait).

Bird of the day: Orange minivet

Other vertebrate of the Day: Giant squirrel (the Committee agreed – a little reluctantly that as all had seen the species – albeit different beasts – it was eligible).

Pattern of the day: a concrete design in the Gardens that encased some swirly things.

Bad taste of the day: Muzak in the Hotel bar.

 

Read on

April 29 Culture, Butterflies, Birding and Tuskers

Birding visit to Polonnaruwa (A UNESCO World Heritage Site), the medieval capital of Sri Lanka. Visit the world famous rock-cut Buddha statues of Gal Vihara and the Parakrama Samudra (‘Sea of Parakrama’) a 2500-hectare man made reservoir built by King Parakramabahu I (1153 –1186 AD) with a capacity of 134 million cubic metres. Birding highlights include Wooly-necked Stork, Sri Lanka Grey Hornbill, Large Cuckoo Shrike and Coppersmith Barbet. On the way see large number of Flighters and the following butterflies: the Zebra Blue, the Monkey Puzzle, the Plain Cupid, the Common Guava Blue, the Peacock Royal, the Common Shot Silverline, The Spot Sword Tail and the Red Spot Duke. Afternoon, visit Minneriya National Park for Elephants

 The day began early with a stroll around the village outside the hotel.  We scored two additions to the trip list (White-rumped Munia, building a nest just outside the lobby, and Banded Bay-cuckoo).  As we got back towards the hotel there were many cops standing around.  As expected these were thought to be waiting for a Minister or such like to be in the area.  

The cops were not photographed (this seems to be frowned on just about anywhere except New York) but this guy heading off to collect the laundry was quite happy to pose.  

I am not sure of the terminology in "Ceylon" but in Raj days I am sure he would have been a dhobi wallah.  He, and his ox, star again tomorrow morning!  Back at the lobby of the Hotel I photographed the floral designs that were strategically placed around the area:

This has been taken on board as something pleasant to do around our house in Carwoola.  We haven't gone so far as to decorate the bed, in the way we found last night:

As we headed off to Polonnaruwa we were distracted by a very large standing Buddha statue

accompanied by many statues of monks - all the statues were named according to the monk they represented and indeed they are all quite different in appearance when looked at closely.

As seen in the RH of the first image the one closest to the Buddha was coloured blue, indicating that this was the Buddha's principle assistant.

As we moved further along the road we noticed that there were electric fences beside the road.  Nanda explained that these were erected to keep elephants in the wilderness area and out of the village vegetable gardens.  (In other areas there were towers in the gardens where the farmers stayed over night with a series of bonfires and rattleable cans over the fields to scare the elephants off. )  This led Rob to contemplate Elephants as the ultimate garden pest and to speculate whether, if they were in Australia the garden centres would be offering giant Jumbo Swatters or 200l kegs of Tusker repellent!

Getting on to the main road we paused briefly to check out some cormorants.  A couple of them were Indian Shags - the same species that got me arrested in Burma in 1984!

After crossing a dampish section supplied interesting roadside hazard signs 
we came to an area well supplied with military establishments but ignoring the risks of revisiting Burma I took a photo of another standing Buddha.

It being a main road in Sri Lanka there had to be a bike race happening!

The first bit of the site we visited was a museum with many interesting artefacts.  Photos were not permitted so as to not interfere with sales of books. As with the other archaeological sites visited most of my photos are in a special post.

After that we headed off to see a controversial statue: some authorities reckon it is a King with an interest in farming holding a hoe, while others saying it is just a monk holding a prayer scroll.  Nearby were some very active monkeys enjoying playing games and doing a little proctology (without a headlamp).

When we got to the ruins of Polonnuruwa we noted a sign that "Chorus may provoke wasp attacks".  The area was generally devoid of Sri Lankan visitors and the early highlight of this visit was a young couple of hawkers  (who had reluctantly given up trying to sell us tacky souvenirs) showing us a juvenile Brown Fish Owl. 

A few rupees changed hands in the hope that this would encourage them to adopt eco-tourism and care of wildlife as a trade rather than tourism hassling!

Our final spot was to look at a large reclining Buddha 

 near which was a public lecture by an eminent monk.  Most of the audience were elderly ladies who had partaken of lunch.  As they were sitting in the sun this combination of circumstances was causing a few Zs to get emitted.  This led the eminent monk to give them some advice about staying awake!  I think by the time I took this surreptitious shot he had moved back to other aspects of acquiring good karma!

 As a result of this we were a bit behind schedule and it was agreed we would swap the planned visit to Minneriya National Park to the following day and head off to Dambulla Cave Temple on this day.  En route we called in to a restaurant so that the workers could get some lunch.  Rob and I visited a nearby small shop to acquire water and in my case a packet of biscuits: the latter cost a whole 25 rupees and as Rob said I would happily have paid 100R for them.  I also got a nice picture of a roadside Ganesa (as usual carrying a bit of condition, but pretty happy in his work).

The Cave Temple proper was rather good in contrast to the very tacky modern structure (funded by Japanese aid) at the bottom of the hill.   I thought these cave-resident Buddhas were particularly interesting.

 For the first time a local gent - presumably of the Hindu persuasion - was spruiking snake charming skills.  Another entrepreneur sold Rob a rather snappy shirt.

Back at dinner we requested a table upwind of yesterday's smokestack.  Not needed as he had been positioned out in the lawn well away from other diners.

Bird of the Day: Brown Fish Owl
Other Vertebrate of the Day.  Monkeys being monkeys (ie mischievous)
Pattern of the day Statues of monks.
Bad taste of the Day New Dambulla Temple

A couple of other birds got to stroll down the carpet:

• a Grey hornbill (for a reason I can neither remember nor decipher from my notes;
• Wooly-necked Stork seen feeding in a lake (new for trip and quite unusual for the country)

Read on