Day 8 - Jeep Safari at Yala

Snake neck Cormorants and black headed Ibis.

Next day was the jeep safari in the Yala National Park. It was a very bumpy ride with huge potholes - even could be called craters! We stopped to photograph anything of interest. I had to delete a lot of previous photos to make room on my memory.

This little bird is a White-browed Fantail and she was sitting on her nest right next to the road. She was not a bit perturbed by all the photographing going on nearby. While we watched she left the nest and her partner came to take over.

This is a yellow wattled Lapwing sitting on a nest. We saw loads of water
buffalo. They were also being used to plough the rice fields in other parts of the country.

I think this is a grey heron, but honestly my photos are not much good are they?

I just loved these brilliant green bee-eaters which were darting all over the place.

In this picture there is a Painted Stork, a Spoonbill and two Warthogs.

Well, that is just some of the things we saw. Notably we did not see the leopards or the sloth bears which was disappointing, but not all that surprising. We did see a few elephants and crocodiles and the land Monitor.

We were also disappointed not to be staying at the Yala Hotel which is closed for refurbishment. This was advertised as "view some of the local wildlife from your observation deck, or step into the jungle from your luxury chalet to watch the elephants walk by or the elusive leopard sunning itself on the rocky outsrop close by" HUH

Where we actually stayed was the Mandara Rose Hotel which did not match up to the advertised Yala Hotel!!! Although we did see some wildlife close by - there were a lot of flies and a few cockroaches in the rooms.!!! The swimming pool was very good though and had some shady trees around and the food was good too. Not many of the staff spoke English either which made life difficult.

After the very tiring 4 hour safari yesterday, we had a day at rest.

Snake neck Cormorants and black headed Ibis.