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Wikipedia Link, Sir David Attenborough

Trip Date: September 2004

Palitha had received a call from Kumana, saying that the “crossed tusker” had been sighted near the park entrance the previous day. Judging from it’s previous behavior, it was likely that it would remain in the vicinity for a few days.  A very quick round trip was hastily organized.  We would leave early the next morning, drive to Kumana, photograph the tusker and return the next day. Sounded simple enough, until you consider that it’s an eight hour drive one way, also that the tusker had to co-operate and present itself to us. We planned to camp at the old bungalow site called Thumulla.  This was all new to me as Jackie and I had never been to Kumana before. This was a first.

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On many occasions the trips that turn out the best are the ones that are unplanned, and more ‘spur of the moment’. These trips, most often lack any kind of preparation and result from some unexpected free time coming up, or the dire need for a ‘jungle fix’. Gehan and I had such trip to Wilpattu, late in 2005. We had both been working pretty hard for a couple of weeks, and just needed a night in the jungle to bring some sanity balance. After a phone call late on a Friday night, we decided that we would drive up to Wilpattu the next morning.
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Chilaw Sand Spits 24th and 25th November 2007

Finally, the exhibition and book launch was over. It was time to relax and do some birding and maybe, if lucky, some photography. As much as I enjoyed doing the book, it was tiring and I needed some time out. The Sri Lanka Natural History Society organizes trips for it members, and they had planned a day trip on the 24th to Labugama to do some birding. I had put Jackie’s and my name down, but had to travel in my own cab, as my equipment takes up too much space in the van.
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Jackie and I were finally heading back to Yala. The last time we spend some time in Yala was in February. By our standards that is a long time. New house and new job has kept me busy and all we could manage was a weekend dash. We were to be joined by Darrel and his family as well as Srikumar and his family.

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The Three-toed Kingfisher is one of the most vibrantly colored birds in the country and photographing it has been a challenge that we have been after. Nestled deep in the Kurunegala district is a little village on the road past the famous Ridi Viharaya where we have made friends with a village boy who has been a great source of information to us on the bird life in the area. We had specifically asked him to inform us if there was any sighting of a Three-toed Kingfisher.

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It all began with a phone call from Sasu (Samantha Suranjan Fernando) the orchid and plant expert about this amazing trip to the peak wilderness Sanctuary. When he described the last small herd of the forest elephants that roam in this forest that no one has photographed I was on for the adventure. We planned the trip for August as Samantha suggested, because most of the flowering plants bloom this month. Kiran Kumaranayagam our other partner also agreed to join us.

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What you can see there:
Minneriya and Kaudulla are two different parks, situated very close to each other. Both parks revolve around tanks (man made water reservoirs). This is arguably the best place in the world, to see Asian Elephants. During the drier months, hundreds of elephants are attracted by the water and the grass that grows at the dried up beds of the tanks. Some tuskers are also present among the herds. Birding is excellent. Other mammals are found but difficult to see. If the big herds are not at one park they are usually at the other. The best time is from June to September

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What you can see there:
Another park that was closed during the war. Great Park for birds. Elephant, leopard and bear can also be found here.

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