The National Parks and strict natural reserves of Sri Lanka are famed far and wide and provide thrilling experiences with to wild life enthusiasts. Visitors to the island paradise include jungle safaris in their itinerary. The eastern coastal belt with its calm bays and golden sands is home to several tourist destinations with the bay of Passikudah being a hot favourite and with the Yala and Kumana National Parks being major attractions. Passikudah hotels range from up market resorts to budget hotels and if it is high end amenities in beautiful surroundings you are looking for, then a good choice of accommodation would be Sunrise by Jetwing.
The Kumana National Park (formerly Yala East) is located in the district of Ampara 391 km or so from Colombo. The gateway to Kumana is at Panama with the park office located at Okanda 22 km south of Panama. The 35,664 ha park is bordered on the West Kumubukkan Oya and on the South by the South Eastern Coast running up to Panama.
Kumana is an Ornithologist’s Paradise and famed for avifauna. The 200 ha mangrove swamp ‘Kumana Villu’ is filled with nesting and breeding water fowl and wading birds especially from May to July.’ Kuda Vila Wewa’, ‘Thummulla Wewa’ and ‘Kotalinda are three other gathering places for birds. All in all there are around 20 lagoons within the park.
The endemic, resident and migrant population includes birds like the very rare black necked stork, red faced mal koha, little grebe, pelicans and spoonbills, great thick knee, greater racket tailed drongo and the ruddy turnstone. The Kumana National Park is contiguous to the Yala National Park and animals move freely between the two. Elephants, leopards, Ceylon golden jackal, European otter and wild boar are some species of mammals found here. Reptiles at Kumana include the mugger crocodile, Indian flap shelled turtle and Indian black turtle. The Kumana area is part of an ancient civilization dating back to the third century B.C. Many tour operators organize safaris to Kumana and hotels provide facilities to visit Kumana.
Damon Starky is a creative nomadic travel writer, who is well informed and experienced on a wide range of interests that would connect to the needs of any type of traveler. Google+
