Organizing a wildlife trip for a famous BBC reporter and his group, encountering the most spectacular sightings possible, it sounds like a dream, right? In March, we at Jetwing Eco Holidays had the opportunity to make this dream come true. Together with Iolo Williams and his group, we explored the most incredible wildlife of Sri Lanka. And we got lucky: wonderful animals were spotted, both on land and at sea.
With this blog post, we want to take you with us on the journey and give you a taste of the amazing wildlife!
We started in Negombo, sharing our expectations of the trip with an outdoor dinner. What animals would we love to see? Will we be able to see a Leopard? And maybe the Big Blue Whale? We all thought about it while driving to Balapitiya the next day, where we did a Madu River Boat tour. Besides magnificent birds, like the Crested serpent eagle, Brahminy kite, White-bellied sea eagle, Whiskered tern, and some Blue-tailed bee-eaters, we were surprised by a land monitor, slowly moving on the river banks. Our final destination of the day was Matara, but we decided to visit the Kosgoda Turtle Hatchery en route, where we learned more about the life and the breeding process of the turtles.
In Matara, the next days were only about one thing: the incredible sea creatures we got to see during the private whale watching excursions. We spotted not only the famous Spinner Dolphin and Indo-Pacific bottlenose Dolphins, but were also treated with the most incredible sightings of two Bryde Whales and even two Killer Whales! Being this close to such impressive animals makes you think how small we actually are. Looking in the water, some of us spotted some Green sea turtles, slowly moving in the deep water. During the BBQ dinner near the beach, you could hear everyone, full of excitement, talking about what we saw that day. If the trip went on like this, it would be an incredible experience for everyone! How could we know that the best was yet to come?
The next day, we saw something none of us could have ever imagined seeing ever: a whole colony of Fruit Bats, also called Megabats. Thousands of them, roosting in Tamarind Trees! Sri Lanka is known for its colonies of Fruit Bats, but so many?! That is an exception!
The wetlands also treated us with views of Greenshank, Baya weaver, Stork-billed kingfisher, and Malabar pied hornbill. Every birding enthusiast would have gone crazy here, just like us!
Yala National Park, our next destination, never disappoints. From the Asian Elephants to Ruddy and Striped-necked Mongoose, from a Black-naped hare to Mugger crocodiles and Spotted deer, we saw them all! And of course, we were again treated with many sightings of birds: The Chestnut-headed bee-eater, some Indian peafowls, Woolly-necked storks, Green bee-eaters, the Sri Lankan junglefowl, the Sirkeer malkoha, and the Crested hawk-eagle! And to top it all off, the Leopard made its appearance! Everyone was overjoyed and impressed by so many animals, in such a small number of days!
On March 11, sadly we had our last safari: The last chance to spot incredible creatures. And yet again, we saw many birds. The Indian roller, with its amazing blue-colored wings, the Brown fish owl, the Blue-faced Malkoha, and many Rosy starlings came across during the afternoon safari. But also, animals we had not seen yet like Water buffalos and Star tortoises crossed our paths.
After days of safaris, dozens of animals, hundreds of pictures, and thousands of memories, we went back to Negombo, where we spent our last night at the beach, watching an amazing sunset and talking about the many impressions we had had during the trip.
For each naturalist, each animal-lover, BBC reporter, tour guide … this was the perfect trip, all thanks to the many animals we encountered and the incredible nature Sri Lanka has to offer!
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