We left Unawatuna about half 9 and arrived at tissa around 3ish - it was a very long drive. Thank God for air con. We arrived at the guest house which was nice - very quiet as it was just us staying. We spent an hour or so there and the owners made us a banana juice which was nice. We then took a wander to the town and back, almost got lost but we were on the right track the whole time. We went for dinner at the restaurant at the hotel and although it took blinking ages it was fantastic and huge portions, Amy and I shared 4 curries, a massive bowl of rice and some poppadoms. Delicious and only one of them was too spicy. We then hit the hay ready for our early morning safari in yala national park.
We got up for Yala at 5 am and the owner of the hostel came to check we were up and gave us a breakfast for the road which was so cute. Our Jeep driver was waiting for us outside when we got there so we hopped straight onto the Jeep and off we went. Tissa is about 20 km outside of the park so we got there about 6am and bought our tickets, for the driver, the Jeep hire, the guide and entrance fee we payed about 5000 rupees each, which is roughly £25.
The whole trip lasted about 6 hours and during that time we saw a fair amount, my favourite being the cutest family of elephants that strolled across the road in front of us and waited for a while next to us chewing grass. We also saw a mongoose - definitely in my top five animals, so funny looking - a bear, tonnes of peacocks, monkeys and apparently a leopard but it was so far away I'm not convinced it counts. Among those was plenty of boring birds and stuff like that as well.
When we were all happy the driver turned us around and we headed back. The journey was really bumpy which was horrific for the bladder as there was no toilet on route and I drank a lot of water.
When we got home our driver was waiting for us so we quickly packed up and left. Amy was very stressed packing up fast, she's not yet mastered this art. We hit the road to Ella. I was in the front which was pretty awkward as I cannot understand Ashan at all but it was OK. He stopped at one point to get us some woodapples which is a fruit he likes, I was less than keen and couldn't even finish my half. So sour and so grim. It was nicer with salt but still horrible.
We also stopped to see the waterfall just outside Ella called rawana falls. It was pretty beaut. We had a climb in and got some good pictures and then found our hostel,its called beauty mount tourist inn. I think it's the worst one so far, pretty horrible and the owners are pretty grim - ita family run and the family have 3 teeth between them. But Ella itself is really nice, a busy little town and its so much cheaper than down on the beach. I had kottu and rotti for dinner (which was fantastic ) it was a good portion and it came to £2.50 including a tip and a. 1.5litre bottle of water. Blows my mind.
Tomorrow we're up at 7 to climb little Adams peak and then we're heading to nuwara elisiya.
