tissa – Where is Phil now?

Friday 29 March 2013 – Tangalla.

It is hard to believe it is Easter Friday again, another year gone. Sri Lanka is a secular Buddhist nation so there is no mass celebration of Easter here and life continues as normal. This of course means no hot cross buns or chocolate rabbits, which I am not sure is a good thing or not.

As I said yesterday I had a lousy sleep in this sauna of a hotel room – and yes I could have taken the air con room, hindsight says that would have been the right option – but I have yet to use one in Sri Lanka, so I did not think I needed it. A good rain and the humidity will disappear, for a while. But a lack of sleep did mean a nice time talking, via email, with El back in London before I had to drag myself off the bed and into a cold shower at 4:30 am. It was game drive day in Yala National Park and Benne and I were being picked up at 5:00. We were also moving on after the game drive so I had to pack everything up so the hotel owners could take my pack to their store room once they were up.

We had arranged to share a jeep with Adam and Jules, an English couple we met on the bus yesterday. It halved the cost of the vehicle for Benne and I and made it a much more attractive option than doing it solo. They were a wee bit late picking us up and we ended up spending almost thirty minutes on the side of the road outside the hotel. 5:00 is a very busy time on the main roads in a safari town!

Yala is the biggest of a number of national parks in Sri Lanka and is probably the most visited. It has all the usual suspects for Sri Lankan game drives – elephants, leopards, crocs, buffalo and a gazillion different kinds of bird. I had mixed expectations, I have read and heard stories of people seeing nothing but birds and stories of leopards and elephants galore. I just hoped to see elephants – experience says do not have high hopes of leopards!

The park is about 30km from Tissa and we briefly stopped near one of the lakes for a sunrise shot, I haven’t seen too many sunrises on my travels; or sunsets either to be honest. I am not a particularly good travel photographer!

We stopped at the ticket office amongst the masses of other jeeps, I was initially thinking this was just going to be one long jeep train, but was pleasantly surprised that once the Sri Lankan Micheal Schumacher got us in to the park we were mostly alone.

There was this tiny wee crocodile in a pond near the entrance. I did see one large croc but it was too far away to take a photo of.

This is our vehicle, admittedly it looks like all the others : ) but it was OK.

The game drive lasted about five hours before we had to suggest we headed out of the park to meet mid-day check outs. From a time perspective it was good value, it was also pretty good fun, our driver was knowledgeable and engaging and there were loads of birds to. As expected we didn’t see any leopards and for a while I was worried we would not see any elephants either, there are only a hundred and twenty or so and it is a big park. Our guide was just so phenomenally good at spotting thing though, finding small green birds deep in the foliage while bouncing along a deeply rutted track smoking a cigarette seemed to be no issue at all. We saw loads of buffalo,

Birds of all shapes and sizes

Monkeys for Africa – hmmm, but I guess they already have enough.

Mongooses/mongeese ? : ) on the run

Warthogs

Spotted deer.

And finally as we drove up a small side road we came across a couple of other jeeps parked and found a female elephant with a couple of young. They were all well hidden in the forest and for the first time since I left England I regretted not having my DSLR or a view finder on the GX1, my photos are all mis-focused sadly. The camera was a sod to use in the bright light and I must have accidently hiot some function that was taking bracketed exposures – not what I wanted when it was so hard to focus. Given I was uber frustrated with the camera today, I did get some photos worth keeping, some of them only because I had little choice.

Later in the morning we came across this lone bull far across a distant swamp.

We went to a beach to look get out of the jeep for a bit to stretch our legs and take a break from the spine pounding from the deeply rutted trails. There was a memorial at the beach for the forty seven people who died here during the tsunami of 2004. I cannot comprehend how terrifying that must have been.

After the beach break we asked the jeep driver to take us back to our hotels as is was getting to the end of the agreed paid for tour as well as check out time, mid-day is never going to be prime time to see leopards, or much else so it was silly to bounce around for too much longer.

Back at the hotel we paid bills and took a tuk-tuk to the main bus station in Tissa to get a bus to Tangalle (Tangalla – two different spellings). There was a bus departing as we arrived so we piled on and the conductor shoved our packs under seats – such a good idea and not one I have seen before! It was a fast and crazy two hour ride to Tangalle, this driver used the heavy foot brake more than anyone else and I was constantly flying forward into the seat in front. Benne and I got up and ready to go at the village prior to Tangalle and it was a hair raising ride standing up in a packed bus trying to manage a pack as well as a heavy day bag – and hang on for what seemed like dear life. Road runner – yes, Best Rider – hmmm, hugely debateable…

I had booked myself accommodation in Tangalle as I knew it would be expensive and likely frustrating as it is a major tourist centre. The south coast is where the bulk of the casual tourists go so space would be at a premium. I was absolutely rapped with my choice, it was twice the price as anything else I have stayed in in Sri Lanka, but cheap compared to some countries. It has a pool, air con, a great shower, is clean throughout and best of all has wicked wifi access. I am shallow I know.

Once settled in I took a walk back in to town and finally replaced the jandals (flip flops) that were nicked in Malawi back in November and bought some beers at the local beer bar. I made use of the fabbo internet to Skype with El for a while, it was so cool to actually be able to see her rather than the heavily pixelated image I had last time. I had an excellent rice and curry dinner in the restaurant before retiring to my room and watching an old English TV series “The Beiderbecke tapes” on my laptop.

A long but pretty damn awesome day.

Thursday 28 March 2013 – Tissamaharama.

I was awake ridiculously early considering we were aiming for the 9:15 bus to our next destination which is about four hours away – Tissamaharama, or Tissa for short. As the coffee and pancakes had no negative impact on me yesterday I totally abandoned my no eating or coffee before a long bus ride rule and repeated yesterdays breakfast as there was time to kill before the bus. We got to the bus stop by 9:00 and there was already a small group of westerners waiting for the bus. The main drag of Ella was pretty deserted.

The bus was late and a few more people had turned up before it arrived, we got to talking to an English couple, Adam and Jules while we waited and exchanged numbers to talk later in the day about sharing a jeep for a safari tomorrow morning. There was the usual scramble to get on the bus, which was already fairly full. Adding a dozen westerners all with large packs seemed to be a challenge the conductor relished, he moved other passengers about, put packs here and there and managed to get everyone seated, an amazing piece of work as I would not have thought it possible!

The driver was the fastest so far in Sri Lanka and we howled down from the hill country towards the south coast beaches. We were all hanging on tightly to prevent being tossed from side to side, it was a crazy run down, though strangely I did not feel at all terrified – unlike Vietnam. We only had one eye closing moment as we overtook a car into the face of an oncoming truck. We stopped a few times on the way, seemingly at random and usually incredibly sharply. At the main town we had the usual vendors board the bus but also a lottery ticket seller which I haven’t had on the bus before, though there are dozens in the street of every town. The guy standing chose to stand exactly next to a row of three girls even though at one stage the seat in front was empty. No one else was standing…

In the last village before Tissa the bus was boarded by a whole bunch of touts selling the various guest houses and safari rides, it was all a bit hard sell and I didn’t particular enjoy it, though it was worse once we all got off the bus. As we did not have anywhere to stay we ended up being the last ones in the bus stop and were mobbed by a group all yelling hotel names and rides to various places. I told them all to keep quiet so Benne and I could talk. I was remarkably polite too. We eventually decided on a place and got a free ride in their safari jeep. The hotel was nice, cheaper than some places and exceptionally clean and tidy. I elected to take a room without air con – a decision I regretted all night long. We arranged with Adam and Jules to use the safari company from their guesthouse as it was cheaper than ours. Wahoo – a game drive in Yala National Park tomorrow.

After a fried rice lunch Benne and I went for a walk to find a tuk-tuk to take us to a nice old dagoba we had seen on the way in, though on the first attempt we ended up at the wrong one, but decided to take a look anyway. I loved thr rice drying in the drive way.

Our next attempt was thwarted as the tuk-tuk driver did not speak any English, though he faked it enough to get us in the tuk-tuk. As we went the wrong way at the lake I spotted the dagoba out of the corner of my eye so we got out and walked.

Tissamaharama Chaitya was constructed around 150BC and is 180ft high, it too is supposed to contain a Buddha tooth relic – he must have had one heck of a large mouth ! It was my favourite Dagoba in Sri Lanka, I liked it for the roof supports from the buildings around the outside. It was also great to be the only people there. Tourists don’t come to Tissa for the ruins, they come here to access Yala National Park.

We walked into town after as I wanted to get a new hat and I found a nice ‘Adidas’ cap for five bucks – score! We bought some beer from the beer shop. This is a fairly non-typical one, they are usually dirty and grungy with solid steel bars and a small point to hand money in and bottles out. I find it ironic the way they are called wine stores, but don’t sell wine, only beer and cheap spirits. There are always customers…

We stopped by the lake on the way back to the hotel but had missed the last of the good light. I would loved to have been able to wade out there and get into the trees, but there are lots of crocodiles here!

We went back to the hotel and had a beer before walking around the street looking for some dinner. The one other place open was selling meals at London prices so we ended up going back to our hotel, where they opened the kitchen for us. There are not that many people here!

After a very average meal we went to bed. It was so hot and humid and the fan barely penetrated the mosquito net which I had to use as it was mossie city here. It was not a great night. I ended up having a nice long email conversation with El from 3:30 until it was time to get up at 4:30 and get ready for the safari It was a pity the internet was rubbish and we couldn’t Skype, but it was a lovely way to start the day.

Tag: tissa

A game drive in Yala National Park.

To Tissa