Traffic jam

Ella to Yala

We were sorry to leave our tree top home with the flying squirrels but pleased to see the back of the treacherous steps. We stopped off at Ravana Waterfall where some local men were having a great natural shower with strong water pressure even though it was probably very cold.

As we approached Yala we rechecked the reviews of the hotel we'd planned to stay at and started having second thoughts about the place. Fortunately we were able to cancel for free so we changed to a nicer place for the same cost, though it was a little further from Yala National Park. They were also gracious enough to let us check in early. 

Sam returned with a safari jeep and a driver just after 2pm to take us to Yala National Park, the home of the Sri Lankan leopard. We stopped at the office to buy the entrance ticket and before we knew it a man in uniform had climbed into the back of the jeep saying he was our guide. We thought this was just a standard thing for this national park, but we then saw that none of the other jeeps had guides in them. K asked him if we needed to pay extra for him, he replied that we did. By this point we were confused, no-one had told us we'd have a guide or that there were more costs involved, and on top of that he was pretty useless, as both he and the driver were pointing out animals, many of which we'd already spotted ourselves. We took it up with Sam and suddenly we didn't have to pay, all very strange. 

Yala was overcrowded and noisy, wherever you looked there was a bunch of jeeps, it was like a massive traffic jam. Just when you thought it couldn't get worse large machinery came past, loads of portable toilets on trucks, tractors on trucks, caravans, the entire thing was ridiculous. What kind of animal would be stupid enough to choose to be near a freeway running through its home? 

No-one we spoke in the other jeeps had seen a leopard, in fact not much had been seen at all. We thought we were wasting our time in this noisy place with very poor roads, so we said we'd  had enough and wanted to leave. On the way out we came across a few groups of elephants with babies of different sizes, some mongoose, a jackal and some black faced monkeys. 

Overall it was quite a disappointing visit, there need to be restrictions on how many vehicles can enter the national park at one time as it really detracted from the experience and most likely scared away the animals we had hoped to see.