We got up at the fart of a sparrow’s crack to drive to the Wilpattu National Park. As the sun rose over the paddy fields we began to wake up a bit but a quick stop for fuel turned into 30 mins with no fuel. There is a shortage here. Most of the filling stations are either out of petrol or have queues a couple of hours long and there is a ration of 15 litres per person a week. Tourist vehicles have an exemption but the tech wasn’t working at our filling station for the QR code so there was a lot of head scratching and eventually we moved on. This meant that our driver couldn’t come with us as he had to go back to find another place to queue. He dropped us at the safari Jeep centre where we were greeted by our safari driver who looked about 11, spoke barely a word of English and the jeep was basically a metal cage with wheels. He was lovely by the way, and as we speak no Sinhalese we can’t complain.

The first hour or so was promising. We saw some deer and some interesting birds and a water buffalo. Then some more deer and some more not-so-interesting birds and several buffalo. Then a few more deer and lots of water buffalo and the odd bird and a lot of peacocks. And a mongoose. And more mongooses. Or is it mongeese? We knew it wouldn’t be like the Masai but here is a completely different terrain. We were driving through forest. Terracotta clay paths that powder the tree trunks red, with huge termite mounds emerging from the ground like red monsters. With the undergrowth and leaves the world is terrecotta and green – almost monochromatic in effect, other than the constant smattering of pastel coloured butterflies doing their dance. At first it was striking, like a Hockney iPad painting, but it began to lose its appeal. There was nothing to see but trees and path and with the constant tumble-dryer effect of the jeep on rough terrain, and the red dust in our lungs and eyes, 4 hours in I’d just about had enough. We were both bored and I felt car-sick and we still had 5 hours to go.

We stopped at the toilets, which was the most interesting part of the day so far because of the very cute monkeys who hang about for food. One jumped into our jeep, got straight under the drivers seat and found his lunch. He’d just about unwrapped the bag before he was shooed away.

We tried to explain to the driver that I felt car sick and we’d like to leave early. “Toilet trouble?” He asked. No – car-sick. He found another guide who spoke English. He looked confused. He approached me and asked “Are you pregnant?” Apparently the driver thought that’s why I felt sick. After a great amount of laughter all around the guide said “Well I took one look at you and thought no way!”. Rub it in why don’t you. Now with my fertility status established it was agreed we’d have an early lunch and work our way back. Another hour of body shaking forest monotony, we parked by a lake, ate our chicken wraps and moved on. About 10 mins later the driver let out a yell. Leopard!! He was so excited he looked like he was going to cry. And there she was, crouched calmly a few metres in front of us on the path, drinking from a puddle. Absolutely stunning. We sat, she sat. She didn’t acknowledge us in any way. Occasionally she perked up to the sound of deer in the forest, but mostly she sat, washed herself and then slept. So we watched her sleep. She’d rise, yawn, stretch, and go back to sleep. At one point I started to doze off too. The driver was beside himself. Kept telling us how lucky we were. He was constantly messaging, filming and taking selfies. After about 40 minutes we wondered if we’d ever move if she didn’t. We were almost out of water and I’d given the fruit from my lunch to some Sri Lankan guys parked up at the lake beside us at lunch time. Can you eat peacock? Is it safe to drink from a muddy puddle? Can you make wine from bamboo leaves? Then 2 jeeps came in behind us. The driver shared his victory, we drove forward and the leopard reluctantly slunk back into the trees as we advanced. He drove straight back to the toilet area, jumped out of the jeep and let all the other drivers know about the find. All of a sudden, engines were revving and confused tourists were being shouted out of the toilet blocks to jump into jeeps and race to where we’d been. The poor monkeys were denied their scraps. Jubilant after finding the money shot we were spent, but we had to get home somehow and that was a couple of hours away, so we found some elephants. 3 to be precise. Surprisingly amazing to behold. Absolutely massive compared to the African ones we saw last year and majestic is not a word descriptive enough but it will do. We watched a couple, the male in the lake, the female watching from the shore. She seemed to be calling him in. He did as he was told, but once he was out he managed to persuade her to get back in and soon they were both mucking about in the water. In reality they were probably eating reeds for survival but it looked like they were having fun so I’ll go with that image.

Then we went back to base – not early as we’d asked but we were glad we hadn’t left because of the leopard and elephants. The heavens opened on the way back and we were soaked through but happy bumping about in our jeep. Chandanna had found fuel, he took us back to the hotel, we ate delicious curry. Another day done.