Full Moon Poya day began as all moon-centric days should begin…with lunacy. Tension with D, hormonal cascade of relentless teariness over the dogs and Life, followed by migraine. Nice. Fortunately, Sri Lanka has a way over turning such days on their head, and loosening the grip of even the most tenacious funk… First, a visit to the gorgeous jungle temple Situlpuwa, famous for having had the world’s largest ordination of Buddhist monks back in the day - 12,000 monks took their vows here, and then took to the caves, spawning 1,000 cave temples from here to Arugam Bay. There are still monks who live in some of these caves, supported (fed) by a special cadre of temple monks, and living out their days with the elephants, leopards, monkeys, wild boars, and snakes. Here, atop this towering rock and its fresh white stupa, sun sets over one shoulder while the full moon rises over the other, through the spare branches of a scrappy tree and its faded and tattered prayer flags. heart opens, softens, and drops. We clamber down in the dark as the horns and drums begin to wail and thump and bounce off the rocks all over the temple site. There is one-tusked elephant making his way through the parking area. We have “special medicine tea” at the little canteen and then head off back down the red jungle road that winds through this corner of Yala National Park. The park officially closes for safari during this month due to the crippling dryness and danger of fire, and wildlife within the park must range further and further afield in search of water. If you happen to be on the right side of the gods, and driving in the relative cool of night, this can radically increase your chances of some very up-close-&-personal encounters with wild creatures…like, say, TWO (F’ING) LEOPARDS, maybe… right on the road…like 20ft away…like stop-your-heart-from-beating INCREDIBLE…one was a yearling, who crossed the road in front of us and then took a yawning, paw-licking little siesta under a bush not 30 ft from where we stopped and silenced ourselves. The second was a big male who was just sitting in the ditch at the side of the road - I could almost have touched him!!! He jumped into the bush but then exited further down the road and we rolled in silence and darkness along behind him, watching the spare perfection of his rippling movement by moon and torch light. Almost as exciting were the 2, very rare, mouse deer, again crazily closeup encounters, the Shiv Cat, a massive porcupine (now and forever in my mind, thx to Sad & Useless Humor post, known as a Stab Rabbit, porcupines are on the verge of extinction here in Sri Lanka), and a gorgeous closeup brush with a Samba deer, whose color resembles the gorgeous hues of pewter and dun and almost-black of the wild water buffalo. So yeah, I’d say the day turned around some, nehe? :))))))
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December 2016
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