Minneriya National Park

The main reason for our visit to this park is the elephants which gathter here in the evening to socialise and drink at a man made tank - sounds like the elephant equivalent of a pub. The park is on the 'elephant corridor' which joins two other national parks, Kaudulla and Wasgomuwa.

For this excursion, our travel organiser had organised a jeep and driver to take us (including our driver Tissa) into the national park. We set off through woodland stopping whenever an interesting bird or animal was spotted. Tissa was clearly knowledgeable about the various species.. As we were driving along, there was a russling and shaking of a tree a short distance away. A large elephant appeared.close by. 'Go, go' said Tissa to the jeep driver, 'Its an elephant and he doesn't look friendly!'. I had a camera pointing in the right direction, fortunately:




We continued on to the ale where we expected to see elephants gathering

Birds spotted on the walk: clockwise from top left: roller; bee eater; painted stork; red wottled lapwing




Family of elephants and deer


On our way back, our driver had a call from the other vehicles that we had set out with. One of the cars was stuck in the mud on the river. We went back to the river at some speed, but to no avail; the back wheels were well and truly stuck. We returned to the entrance to let the driver of the groups bus know where the group was and then dropped him at an appropriate spot to organise the rescue. We were pleased that our travel company had organised a four wheel drive for the trip.




- Pat and John on tour