No Fixed Abode: Serious Glamping

Sat 30 Apr 2016 - Yala National Park safari

With Yvonne over whatever it was, we were off for a two and half hour journey south to Kataragama and the safari company collection point. We opted to have an a/c car/driver who made the usual tourist stops for photos from viewpoints and waterfalls on the roadside and, being Saturday, the locals were out in force too.

En route, the driver suggested we should take the jungle road instead of the main road as we may spot elephants and confirming it was only a ‘little detour, no problem’ we agreed. The hotel had arranged the car/driver and confirmed the price of 7500 rupees. We both agreed now we’d pay him 8000 rupees as he was being helpful. Winding our way across quiet back roads he belatedly explained that a good time to see elephants was very early in the morning or at night, when it’s cool. It was now 11am and very hot.

The collection point was a remote temple a little past Kataragama and we arrived there safely and chilled to wait a short while for our eco safari tour company to collect us. Glenn exchanged pleasantries with the driver during this time and was about to confirm we’d be happy to pay him more, when he told Glenn this pick up point was a long way past the town (it wasn’t), therefore the price would be 8000 rupees now. Very dismayed we paid 8000 rupees and no more. We feel at every opportunity these people want to extract just a bit more from tourists and you have to be guarded about negotiating, agreeing the price and confirming expectations and even then still you’ll get ripped off.

We stepped aboard a safari six seater jeep to be taken to base camp. The road became extremely bumpy with huge potholes and washboarded but we finally made it inside. Even with a hugely discounted price, we have still splurged on a superior safari with luxury camping. Here, we were warmly greeted with an OTT VIP welcome by the camp manager, introducing his naturist, Keith and butler, his name unfortunately unpronounceable for us. ‘Keith’ had got it right.

The VIP bit over, we were whisked away to our tented home for this evening. OMG, what a treat! Proper beds and en suite! The lounge area was a grand design, minimalist, but things that were there, were superfluous. Who needs a zebra pattern rug under the glass coffee table with elephant ornaments all adorned by a tealight lantern next to the three seater settee? The important stuff is, what is going to keep ‘things’ out of the tent during the night. Many of you will know Yvonne’s ‘second worst night of my life’ camping story from Australia and she was keen not to repeat it here.

We were then ushered to the ‘Relaxing area’, more rugs,settees,electric fans and bizarrely, a glass bookcase full of books and then shown the wifi code! Next stop, lunch and our waiter greeted us and took us to our table decked out with damask linen, full cutlery, real glasses and more elephant ornaments. No sight of paper plates and plastic cups and utensils that you drop in a black sack at the end of the meal. This style of camping was a pure revelation to both of us. Yvonne suggested this might be how our safaris are in South Africa next week. Glenn rolled his eyes.

After eating a ridiculously large lunch of several courses and now the heat of the day, we were told to go relax and unwind from the stresses of today's world (yeah, this not working and travelling lark can get stressful) and our safari would start later in the afternoon until it fell dark.

Now chillaxed, we boarded our personal safari jeep with our naturist, Keith, a driver and a National Park ranger. We entered the NP through the VIP entrance gate, with the jeep bouncing and bumping along the red dirt track, the guys slowly surveying the bush. Within minutes we stopped abruptly. Keith and the ranger got very excited about thinking they’d sighted a leopard. AWESOME and ALREADY!! With lots of whispering and binocular toing and froing between them, we were invited to look for the yellow leaf, follow down to the ground and along a bit to the bush floor. Firstly, what sort of instructions are these to follow, secondly, what are we actually looking for, thirdly, how do you focus these binoculars and fourthly, yeah we can spot plenty of yellow leaves, what ONE are you talking about. Needless to say, neither of us spotted the leopard. During the safari we discovered there are about 125 leopards in the whole national park of 378 sq miles and we are visiting a minute fraction of it. We really didn’t anticipate spotting a leopard after hearing that information.

We drove around for four and half hours until pitch darkness. In this time we saw and came close to several elephants with two sightings of rare tuskers, crocodiles, wild boar, wild water buffalo, hornbill bird, lizards, mongoose, several brightly coloured birds and spotted deer, with one alpha male deer showing recent signs of a leopard attack and licking his wounds. Keith could see the two incisor marks on its leg.

Jolting and bouncing back to camp, we were greeted by more VIP treatment, yes, great day, yes, tea lovely, yes, Keith is amazing, yes, we’re ready to eat. Really we just wanted to get showered and changed but were escorted to a lantern lit arena with a fire pit burning in the centre and shown to our intimate table for two with starry lit skies and a cocktail ready for us. The food was gorgeous, we drank our first glass of wine for over a month and it was so hot still, the mosquitoes couldn’t be bothered with us. There was an electric storm in the distance and we enjoyed watching the lightning, chillaxed. Then Keith appeared and suggested a night walk around the boundary of the electric fencing to see what might be out there. We paced along keeping up with his torch light and learning so many interesting facts about subspecies when he shone his torch on the bark of a tree we were standing next to. ‘What can you see?’ he asked. ‘Well, nothing…’ Then we both spotted a huge Tarantula, beautifully camouflaged with a mottled effect. ‘She’s covering her nesting hole with her babies in’ Keith told us. Flipping heck, even more Tarantulas!

Keith was suddenly keen to get us back to camp and we followed his torch light with a quickened pace. The camp manager gave us a phone, for any emergencies during the night, to call him immediately. We wearily trod the path back to the tent, jumped in the ensuite and then to our bed of egyptian cotton too tired to think about what might constitute an emergency.