10 days tailor made from £5,000 pp
From £5,000 pp
At a glance
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Don't forget that all of our itineraries are totally customized and so this is just an idea of what we can build for you.
Yala and Udawalawe hold two of Sri Lanka’s most breathtaking wildlife encounters, and this itinerary gives both the time they deserve.
The whole trip is built on contrast rather than repetition. Mornings in Yala start before sunrise, with the light still flat and gray over the scrubland as the first jeeps head out, engines low so as not to spook whatever might be moving nearby. Udawalawe trades that tension for something calmer: wide grassland, a reservoir catching the morning haze, and elephants that rarely bother to look up as the jeep passes.
By the time Weligama arrives, the appeal is less about spotting anything at all and more about the sound of the surf below the room and the smell of grilled fish drifting up from the beach shacks each evening.
Yala National Park is the centerpiece of the trip’s first stretch, three nights based at a tented camp on the park’s edge, with jeep safaris tracking one of the highest leopard densities anywhere in the world, alongside elephants, sloth bears, and water buffalo moving through open scrubland and dense forest in equal measure.
Udawalawe National Park follows with a single, focused day built around its wild elephant herds, gathered in numbers that rarely thin out even outside peak season.
The final four nights shift entirely to the coast at Weligama, where the pace drops and the days are shaped by whatever feels right: time by the pool, a boat out to look for whales, or a surf lesson. After the intensity of two national parks, four unstructured days on the south coast round out the trip well.
In detail
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Don't forget that most of our itineraries can be totally customized. Our expert team will be able to talk you through all the options.
Day 1: Kotugoda
Landing at Colombo’s Bandaranaike International Airport comes with a private escort off the plane and into a lounge to wait out customs, bags handled on your behalf.
From there, a personal driver takes over for the short transfer to Kotugoda and the first hotel of the trip, a restored colonial house set among coconut groves just outside the city.
The rest of the day is unstructured, a chance to settle in and shake off the flight before the itinerary properly begins.
Day 2 to 4: Yala National Park
A short charter flight from Colombo to Mattala replaces what would otherwise be a long road transfer, putting you at Yala National Park within a few hours of leaving Kotugoda.
The next three nights are spent at a cocoon-shaped tented camp with its own private pool, positioned between the park boundary and the beach.
Yala itself holds one of the highest leopard densities recorded anywhere, and jeep safaris here also turn up sloth bears, wild elephants, wild boar, sambar and spotted deer, water buffalo, and a wide range of bird life, all moving through a landscape that shifts between open plains, rocky outcrops, and pockets of dense jungle.
Day 5: Udawalawe National Park
The drive to Udawalawe National Park comes after breakfast, and the park itself is built around a single, dependable draw: wild Sri Lankan elephants, gathered in herds around the central reservoir in numbers that hold steady across most of the year rather than concentrating only in a short season.
A game drive through the park also turns up monkeys, crocodiles, water buffalo, and the occasional leopard, though elephants remain the reason most travellers come here.
The day ends on the south coast at Weligama, checking in for a four-night stay.
Day 6 to 9: Weligama
The remaining four nights in Weligama are left deliberately open.
Days can be spent entirely by the pool or filled with whatever the coast offers: boat trips out to look for whales, surfing lessons on Weligama Bay’s long, forgiving break, or a slower cycle along the coastal roads.
After the early mornings and long safari days that come before it, this stretch is built for doing exactly as much or as little as feels right.
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