Udawalawe 14th December to 17th December, 2006

My posts have really taken a back seat I have to admit.

Anyway - My husband and a friend of ours were the only people who were going on this trip. Since that day was a working day my husband decided to talk half a day off from work and start off as early as possible. He picked up our friend from her home and came home, where we had lunch and then left Colombo around 1.45 p.m. We were staying at the Society bungalow that night - we reached there around 5.30 p.m.

When we reached the bungalow only Roshan the assistant bungalow keeper was there. We lazed around the bungalow and watched the sunset and then decided to have an early dinner and go to sleep.

The next day we were to stay at one of the bungalows inside Udawalawe National Park. The name of the bungalow is Seenuggala - this bungalow is located by the side of a water body and you get plenty of animal life coming to this water hole.

Having had breakfast, we then partly packed our bags. We then left to the closest town as we wanted to buy fresh fish for our lunch. We were lucky - we did get the fish. We returned to the bungalow, packed the remaining stuff and left the bungalow around 10.30 a.m. It seemed to be rather overcast that day. Went to the park entrance got the preliminaries sorted out and left with tracker Siripala to our bungalow. We reached Seenuggala at about 11.30 a.m.

When we reached the bungalow we were greeted by Moonesinghe, the bungalow keeper, he was busy cleaning the hurricane lanterns. We were then told that lightening had struck the solar panel system and would have to make do with hurricane lanterns. That was fine by us because when we go camping that is all we use.

Since Moonesinghe was very busy cleaning the lamps could not tell him what we wanted for lunch, so we decided to make our beds and take a little nap until then. Finally he finished his cleaning and I told him what to cook. We had lunch and told Moonesinghe to serve tea at about 3.00 p.m. so that we could leave for the evening round by 3.30 p.m. We were quite unlucky - it decided to rain. That meant we were bungalow bound.

We were suddenly alerted by deer calling at the other side of the water hole. We thought sure thing a leopard had come to the water hole. Then all of a sudden there was a call of a deer as though he was breathing his last. We observed with our binoculars and there on the ground was a deer - he had a python wrapped around him. This must have been a pretty big python cos the deer too was a full grown adult. We observed this till the light faded away and we could see no more. We were quite thrilled that we could observe this incident, but felt quite sorry for the deer of course. We then had our customary drink, had dinner and went to bed.

The next morning we woke up at about 6.00 a.m. It was drizzling. However, we decided to go on a morning round. We were charged by a lone elephant - nothing serious though. We also saw quite a few birds. We than decided to go back to the bungalow for breakfast. Had breakfast, told him what to prepare for lunch and decided to take a nap till lunch. Had lunch. We went on our evening round at 3.30 p.m. This time there were plenty of elephants. It rained continuously that evening. We headed for the bungalow. Had our drinks, had dinner and went to sleep.

Woke up to the alarm at 6.00 a.m. the following day. Today we were going to be having brunch as we were leaving that day. Having told him what to prepare we set out. We did some birding and then came back to the bungalow around 10.00 a.m. Had our brunch, packed and left the bungalow around 10.45 a.m. Came to Colombo in the evening.

↑

A Trip to Yala in December 2nd - 4th

We, my husband and I and four other friends of ours, left Colombo around 3.45 am. on the 2nd of December. We were on our way to Yala. However, we first thought we would go to the Bundala National Park and we reached there about 7.30 a.m. There we had breakfast of sandwiches and coffee. Nothing much to see in Bundala - the day was pretty overcast.

We left Bundala around 11.30 a.m. and proceeded toward Yala - we were staying at "Forest Lodge" - this is outside the national park. We reached there around 2.00 p.m. Asked the caretaker to prepare lunch. We had our lunch and then decided we should go on the evening round in the park. We saw only a lonely elephant that evening much to our disappointment. Came back to the bungalow and chilled out. Had dinner and retired for the night.

The next day we woke up and to our disappointment it was pelting with rain. We decided to go back to sleep. Anyway we woke up and had our late breakfast and decided we should do a mid morning round in the park. There was a constant drizzle. However, we managed to spot a leopard but he too made a hasty retreat into the jungle. We also managed to spot a bear and cub and while we were there watching the bear, a jeep driver told us that there was a tusker spotted at the other end of the park so we decided to leave the bear and pursue that. We did manage to locate him - took a few photographs of him and then since it was getting dark we decided to call it a day. We came back to the bungalow around 6.30 p.m. and we immediately asked our bungalow keeper to have dinner ready as we were now famished as we had not had had any lunch. We had dinner, lazed around a bit and then went to sleep hoping that the next day would be a brighter day.

The next day we woke up and to our surprise it was a brilliant day, the sun was shining, the birds were singing. Immediately we had our tea and left hoping that we would have better luck. As we proceeded our tracker immediately asked my husband to stop the vehicle as he thought he had spotted a leopard on a tree - sure enough there was a leopard - but he got down and walked into the jungle - not very obliging!!! He appeared to be a really large male leopard. We drove around quite a bit in the park but no luck - we decided to head back as were coming back home that day.

Headed back to the bungalow, had lunch, packed our bags and came back home. We reached home around 6.30 p.m. with my husband getting the flu.

"The bulldozer and not the atomic bomb may turn out to be the most destructive invention of the 20th century."- Philip Shabecoff

↑

Udawalawe - Timbiriyamankada

This was a trip with majority of the people from the Sri Lanka Natural History Society. We stayed a bungalow called Thimbirimankada in Udawalawe from the 7th to the 10th of September.

We set out from home on the 7th of September, 2006 at around 5.45 a.m. and we met at a friend's place and then set out from there in 3 vehicles. There were 10 of us. We had breakfast along the way at Silverray at Pelmadulla. We got to the park entrance and had to wait sometime for a tracker as there was a crowd that weekend in the park and trackers were hard to come by. We finally got our tracker and headed towards the bungalow. We finally reached the bungalow at around 1.50 p.m. The highlight of this trip for me was, I got to drive in the park, something I usually do not do, but since there were 2 other vehicles in front of us and this park does not have many leopards I decided to drive. We had lunch and rested awhile. Then we had tea and some goodies and set out on our evening round. We did see plenty of elephants.

A couple of elephants decided to charge us this time. But it really was not that bad. It was really bad cos I was driving. We were at Thimbirimankada from the 7th to the 10th. Three of the guys decided to bathe in the river - water was in short supply.

The last day when we were leaving the park we were surrounded by a herd of elephant who decided to do their number and did not let us go for over an hour. When we finally decided to move they decided to charge us - this was bad, and mercifully I was not driving!!!

There was plenty of bird life too. Nothing rare though. We returned home on the 10th night stopping along the way once again at Pelmadulla for a snack.

↑

A one night stop at Udawalawe and a three night stay at Yala

26th August - We left Colombo at around 4.30 a.m. Stopped at Ratnapura to stretch our legs and to have breakfast of sandwiches and coffee. Drove towards Udawalawe. Stopped at the Sankhapala Temple for some photography. Left there and headed towards Udawalawe. Stopped to buy fish for our lunch and proceeded towards the bungalow - The Wildlife and Nature Protection Society bungalow which is located outside the park. We reached the bungalow around 9.30 a.m. Another crowd was supposed to join us, they joined us around 11.15 a.m. We had lunch around 12.30 p.m. Retired for a small nap. Got up, had a wash, had tea and decided to go on a game round around 3.35 p.m. We reached the park entrance only to find that there were no trackers for us to go into the park.

Whilst we were waiting our turn to get a tracker (waiting for a vehicle to come out of the park with a tracker) we met a friend of ours who had been to Yala and Bundala that morning who said they saw absolutely nothing in Yala, which of course was very disheartening cos our next stop was Yala.

Finally a bus came out of the park only to be informed that we could go in but would have to go in 5 other vehicles which was a no go for us especially when you want to do photography. We therefore opted out and went back to the bungalow. We thought we would have a splendid sunset, but that too was a big disappointment as the sun went behind a big cloud. We then had our customary drink, had dinner and went to sleep.

27th August - Woke up around 6.00 a.m. The other crowd with us being disappointed the previous day being unable to go to the park decided that they were not going to miss out this morning. They had actually been quite lucky as they had seen 3 herds of elephant, each herd comprising about 20 - 30 elephants. They had been informed that elephants had not been spotted in a couple of days maybe one or two but not so many!!!! We stayed behind in order to try and photograph any birds that came our way but wasn't that lucky. We all had breakfast and left the bungalow about 9.00 a.m.

We met Peter, the former bungalow keeper of the Wildlife and Nature Protection Society of Yala, chatted with him. Then we proceeded to Tissamaharama to the shopping for our Yala stay. Once that was all completed we proceeded towards the park entrance, reached there around 12 noon. We got our tracker and proceeded towards our bungalow, this time we were staying inside the park and we stayed at a bungalow called "Warahana". We reached the bungalow around 1.00 p.m. We unpacked and went for a river bath. Had lunch and rested a while.

Got up had our tea and went on the game round starting at 4.00 p.m. We saw elephant, had two sightings of bear, one at "Modawala" this sighting was actually a very good sighting as we saw the bear drinking water at this particular waterhole. The other sighting was as Butawa, actually we did not see this bear until the last moment and he was as startled as we were. We went back to the bungalow at 6.35 p.m. Had our usual drink, had dinner and called it a day.

28th August - Woke up, had tea and left the bungalow at about 5.45 a.m. Saw a bear at "Koma wewa". Saw a female leopard cub at a water hole called the "Suduwelimulla water hole" and later saw the brother of the female leopard cub at the "Suduwelimulla boruluwala". He then walked away into the jungle. We then headed toward the bungalow, had breakfast, had a river bath. While we were having our river bath a herd of about 10 deer decided to come and drink just in front of us. We lay flat so they were unable to see us, they were very cautious though knowing that something was amiss. We almost did not breath thinking we would scare them away. One by one they drank water and left. Now that was a very nice experience!!!!! Had a small siesta just before lunch. Had lunch and went on the park round starting at 3.30 p.m. Saw the "weli katta" female leopard at the meda para water hole. Came back to the bungalow. Had a shower, had our drinks, had dinner. A while later we decided to flash the torch into the jungle to see what night animals we could see. To our surprise we saw two sets of eyes reflecting back at us. We identified them as Golden palm cat. We let them go about there business and we went to sleep.

29th August - Woke up, had our tea and left the bungalow around 5.35 a.m. We drove and drove around for a very long time but no luck, suddenly the tracker shouted "kotiya" which means leopard, and true enough a little female leopard cub was seated on the side of the road presumably waiting to cross the road. It changed direction and went into the jungle and we were not able to see it again. This little female cub is the same "Suduwelimulla" cub we had seen earlier. Went on a couple of more rounds and then we headed back to the bungalow at about 9.30 a.m. Had breakfast of roti.

The other vehicle was leaving today, so we had to go and drop them off at the park entrance. Both times that is to and from the bungalow, we did not see anything special. Decided not to have a river bath today as I had been bitten really bad by sand flies and was scratching, instead I rested. Had lunch and tried to sleep a while but that did not happen. Got out of bed around 3.15 p.m., had tea and went on the evening round. Waited at the "Suduwelimulla" water hole and our efforts were rewarded. The male and female cub came out and drank water. The female chased a mongoose but was not successful. We left them and decided to go to Koma wewa as the commotion and the behaviour of the rest of the visitors was totally rude to say the least. Went to the koma wewa bund and met a vehicle full of people. They informed us a leopard had been sighted. We therefore decided to wait a while and sure enough a huge leopard, must have been a male, as we could not see clearly, was observed drinking water. Started the vehicle and the leopard ran across the bund like a scarred cat, he sat for a while on the edge of the bund, in the meantime we decided we would try to get a glimpse of him from the other side but he had done the vanishing trick by the time we came round.

Went back to the bungalow, had our shower, our usual drink and had dinner. That night too we had quite a few pleasant surprises - the golden palm cat, a pair of Indian Palm cat and later on in the night a pair of porcupine who scampered along when they were aware that we were watching them.

30th August - Woke up at 5.00 a.m. Today was our departure day. Went on our morning round. No big animals this time. Photographed some pied kingfisher hovering trying to catch their breakfast. That was a very pleasant experience watching these guys. Came back to the bungalow around 9.00 a.m. Packed, took a short break while waiting for our brunch. Had brunch and left the bungalow around 10.45 a.m. We stopped at Silverray, Pelmadulla for a snack. We reached Colombo around 6.00 p.m and I ended up having a very bad sore throat which later turned out to be an infection and all the complications that come with it, body ache, fever etc.

All in all it was a very pleasant trip as we had quite a bit of luck especially bear as bear is considered even rarer than leopard. So I think we were rather fortunate and I am rather content.

Our next trip will be to Udawalawe on the 7th of September, where we will be staying inside the park at a bungalow called Thimbirimunkada.

↑

A Trip to Yala

It has been a while since we went anywhere, anyway, we went to Yala and we stayed at the Wildlife and Nature Protection Society, Palutupana. Our trip was from the 7th to the 10th of July.

7th July - Set the alarm for 4.00 a.m. but got up only at about 4.45 a.m. Packed the vehicle and left around 5.15 a.m. Stopped for breakfast just past the Udawalawe bund at 8.35 a.m. Left at 9.00 a.m. Reached the Society bungalow, Yala at 1.00 p.m. Had lunch and slept a while. Woke up at 3.00 p.m. had tea and left for the park, but unfortunately the vehicles torsion bar (wonder if I spelt that correctly) jumped out and that meant no evening round but a long and tedious wait in the garage getting it fixed. Went to Tissamaharama to get it fixed. While waiting at the garage we met our first set of friends who were joining us and a little while later our other set of friends joined us at the garage. We finally left the garage around 7.00 p.m. and headed for the bungalow. We had our usual drink and then dinner and chatted till 1.00 a.m. in the morning and finally decided to call it a day since we had to be up early the next morning.

8th July - Woke up to the alarm and got ready and went to the park to get a tracker. Got ourselves a tracker and went to the park. Non of us had any luck. Came back to the bungalow. Played a game of monopoly. Had lunch, went to sleep. Got up had tea and went to the park. We had a sighting of a young man leopard cub. It was a very brief sighting. We left it and headed back out to the bungalow. Had our usual drink and chat and had dinner and rolled into bed around 11.00 p.m.

9th july - Got up in the morning and went to the park. Did not see anything as well today. But our tracker told us a hair raising story. We asked him where he had been on the day of the tsunami and he said he had been in the park. He had been guiding a group of visitors and they were on the main road when a herd of elephant had just cut across their path and seemed to be in a big hurry to get to the other side so they let them pass and when they had passed they proceeded on their journey and lo and behold not even 5 minutes after that he said a huge wave about 20 ft just went past them. If those elephants had not interrupted them they would have probably been in the middle of that wave. We asked him "what did you think at the time" he said, "we did not know what to think". How lucky they were!!!

We then went back to the bungalow. Had lunch and decided to go to the park a little early that day owing to the shortage of trackers. So we went around 2.00 p.m. No luck again on the game round. Came back to the bungalow. Had our usual drinks and chat and had dinner and went to bed early.

10th July - Woke up in the morning. Since we were not having any luck at all we decided not to do the morning round but instead head back to Colombo early. Had breakfast at around 8.00 a.m. and left around 9.00 a.m. Stopped at Silverray at Pelmadulla and had lunch. Went home at about 2.30 p.m.

We never usually miss a morning round, the fact that we were having no luck and we were staying in a bungalow outside the bungalow helped. But had we had done the morning round we would have had to stay till evening probably cos we were later informed by friends who had stayed on that there had been a kill on the main road and the leopard had come and feasted on the kill most of the day right in the open totally oblivious to any vehicles that had come along. The kill was that of a deer. How unlucky we were!!!!!

The route to Yala will basically show you that one has basically got to travel from one coast right across to the other coast that is ofcourse if you are starting off from Colombo.

↑

Wilpattu National Park closed

It is so depressing even to think about what happened in Wilpattu. Yes, I am talking about the 3 pressure mines that were set up by the LTTE to target poor innocent civilians in order to ensure that the park will be closed to carry out their activities. Wilpattu was closed earlier for about 17 years owing to the same problem when terrorists massacred some 23 odd people all park personnel. It was opened about 3 years ago and the amount of hard work that went into opening the park only to be closed again. Wilpattu is 2nd on the list of my favourite national parks, 1st being Kumana which is said to have LTTE camps in it as well. Therefore our trips will be rather limited which is a very sad thing. Wilpattu was just beginning to regain its former glory of being able to see leopard upfront and personal, now all that will be lost again. You can read more about the story at the following

↑

Explanation of some terms

I would like to explain some of the terms used in my previous posting. Term like seeni sambol, kade, Dansala, kola kande and Mudalali

Seeni sambol - seeni means sugar, it is acually made with onions, maldive fish, chillies and other spices and sugar is also added.

Kade - this means a shop.

Dansala - During Wesak as it was, the traditional Dansala was a place for pilgrims to stop and refresh themselves when the travel long journeys.

Kola Kande - It is actually a rice kanji to which various edible green leaves are added.

Mudalali - Shop owner

↑

Nilgala 10th to 14th May

10th May - Left home for Udawalawe at around 5.15 p.m. Waited at the Thalawatugoda junction for a friend and had to wait a while. Met him at 5.45 p.m., then set off to pick up another friend of ours, picked him up from his house and proceeded and it was a traffic ridden drive all the way upto Avissawella where the traffic eased somewhat as many diverted off upcountry. Proceeded to SilverRay situated at Pelmadulla for dinner, then proceeded to Udawalawe. A barn owl decided to fly in front of us. Went to the Wildlife and Nature Proctection Society bungalow at Udawalawe around 11.00 p.m. We had covered a distance of about 148 km. Everyone seemed to be sleeping, woke them up, there were 3 others. Finally after talking shop went to sleep around 12.30 p.m. We did not get to see our bungalow keeper that night as he was fast asleep.

11th May - Woke up around 6.00 a.m. to the sounds of the bungalow keepers radio and kitchen sounds in general. The night was pretty cool as there was a pretty good blowing into the bungalow but when we woke up in the morning it seemed to be pretty humid. Had a shower, had tea and breakfast and left. Travelling along the Tanamalwila road we made a turn off to go to a water body known as Ranmuthuwewa. Spent quite a bit of time here photographing the birds. There was a treeful of Baya weaver birds with their nests. Left Ranmuthuwewa around 9.25 a.m. and headed towards KudaOya Task Camp and reached there around 10.00 a.m. where we had a cup of tea and heard and saw a Jungle Owlet. Left around 12.00 noon and headed towards Bibile. We reached Bibile around 1.50 p.m. Udawalawe to Bibile is about 114 km. We stayed at a place called Hotel Kinikini. Not a bad place!! When we reached there, there was a wedding taking place. We had lunch and left the hotel around 3.15 p.m. for Nilgala for more bird watching.

Bibile to Nilgala which is on the Bibile Ampara road is about 25 km. We saw plenty of birds here. Then we left Nilgala and proceeded further on the Ampara road to look for owls and night jars, we heard the night jar, the jungle owlet and brown hawk owl but could not see any of these birds. We decided to call it a day and head back to the hotel. Had our shower and our customery dring and had dinner and went to sleep. We called Hotel Kinkini the Hilton of Bibile. We had a/c rooms but the fuse seemed to be going all the time. All in all it was not so hot so it wasn't that bad.

12th May - Woke up to the alarm at 5.00 a.m. Had our tea and got ready. Left the hotel at about 6.10 a.m. Proceeded toward Nilgala. Stopped along the way to see the yellow legged green pigeon, saw it but photographing it was a bit difficult as it was pretty far. We were there for about 3 hours watching all kinds of birds and trying to photograph them. Left there about 8.50 a.m. towards Nilgala. Since it was the Wesak weekend there were lots of Dansala's and there was a kola kande dansala just near the turn off to Nilgala and so we stopped and had kola kande here and that was considered breakfast. We then proceeded towards the Nilgala beat with plenty of stops along the way looking for birds. Finally went to the beat and we had lunch here, lunch consisting of bread and seeni sambol and plantain. It rained and didn't it rain hard. Once it ceased we headed back. We couldn't proceed any further at one particular point as the water was so high and the flow so rapid. The villagers said it would recede ina bout 2 hours or so, so therefore in the meantime we decided to go after the painted partridge, we did see a glimpse of the bird. We came back to check the water level and seemed crossable so one vehicle at a time we all managed to cross, there were 3 vehicles. Decided to go to the same point as last evening to look for night jars and owls. No luck. Went back to the hotel at 7.25 p.m. Showered and met up for our customary evening drink. One of the guys in our crowd had been at Yala Safari when the Tsunami struck so we had him relate his story. We then had dinner and went to sleep.

13th May - We were woken up by the person who brought our tea. It was about 5.15 a.m. Went back to sleep though and got up only when my alarm went off that was at 5.30 a.m. Got ready had our tea and had to wait a while till the others got ready. One of our guys were leaving us today owing to prior commitment. We finally left the hotel at 6.30 a.m. We went to the shop and bought cream crakers and cheese but had not decided whether we were going to have it for breakfast or lunch. Once again proceeded towards Nilgala. Somewhere around the 6th km post the vehicle in front of us stopped and the guys got down and made a sign with his hands. I ofcourse thought he was talking about oranges, because I had wanted to buy oranges and incidently Bibile is the best place to buy oranges, but to our surprise it was the jungle bush quail they had spotted on the side of the road. We were very lucky as they gave us a splendid display and a fine photo opportunity as the early morning sunlight was falling directly on them. We saw one male and 4 females, they crossed the road from one side to the other and then back again. We finally departed from there rather satisfied at having got this wonderful opportunity.

We proceeded towards Nilgala and once again stopped around the 17th km post to look for more birds, we also had our cheese and crackers here. This place was not that productive photographywise. Packed up and proceeded. At the Nilgala turn of is a small kade, we asked them if they could make a simple rice and curry for us, they obliged so lunch was taken care of. This time we did not go towards the Nilgala beat but continued along the Ampara road where we looked for owls and nightjars the previous two evenings. Hung around here for a while and went back to the kade to have our lunch as we were quite famished by now. One of the guys spotted a black eagle quite close but no photo opportunity. Reached the kade but to find that lunch was not ready as yet, so we had to wait a while. In the meantime we had a chat with the kade mudalali who said he owned a paddy field which had plenty of birdlife, so we decided that after lunch this is where we will be heading toward. We finally had lunch and went to this place. It was a breathtaking place and as we went in there we heard the call of the painted partridge. It is a very difficult bird to see. We had no luck here photographywise even though we saw the bird. It began to rain and it rained hard once again. We then decided to head back toward the hotel and we reached the hotel fairly early this evening at 5.45 p.m. owing to the rain. We showered and had our ususal drink, had dinner and went to sleep.

14th May - Got up to the sound of the alarm at 5.15 a.m. No signs of our tea. The owner had overslept. He made his appearance just as we were about to leave and he was very apologetic. We left the hotel at 6.00 a.m. Went to the 6th km post hoping to see the quails once again but were disappointed. We heard them call but they did not make an appearance for us. After spending quite a while for them to make an appearance we left and proceeded towards our kade. Since we had not had our morning tea we had our tea at the kade and we also had bread and seeni sambol for breakfast. We then left to go to our new found site to try our luck once again but we were not so lucky with regards to the partridge but we did see the male and female blue button quail and the bare button quail.

We left this place early as today we had to drive back to Colombo. We decided to have lunch at the hotel instead of having it along the way. We left the hotel around 1.10 p.m., we stopped at SilverRay once again for some snacks and tea. Here we said our goodbyes to the other guys in the other vehicle. We dropped the guy who had come with us and we finally reached home at 9.00 p.m.

I took so long to write about this trip as I was desperate to get a map of Sri Lanka Note: When viewing the map place the cursor on the map then at the bottom on the right hand corner you get a box with four arrows. Click on this and this will enable you to enlarge the map to a viewable size. I finally did manage to get one, it is not such a detailed map but I think it gives a rough idea the route to Nilgala.

↑

Today is the day

OK it is now 10.48 a.m. and we will be setting out at about 5.00 p.m. and I am just waiting to hit the road. We are leaving at an awful time cos this is the traffic rush hour but unfortunately this is the only time my husband will be able to get off work. First, as I mentioned in my previous blog we will be spending the night at the Udawalawe Wildlife and Nature Protection Society bungalow of which you have to be a member to book. We will be driving through the night and we should reach Udawalawe depending on traffic in about 3 to 4 hours. We decided to go in the night cos we could then make an early start towards Nilgala.

↑

A trip at last!!

I am anxiously anticipating my trip to Nilgala which will be from the 10th to the 14th of this month. We plan to go to Udawalawe on the 10th night and set out early morning 11th to Nilgala. This trip will most definitely be only bird watching and of course photography. About 6 other people will be joining us. These wildlife images on this site,taken all around Sri Lanka, are a collection of 4 friends work.

↑

To Begin

My blog was orignally intented to brag about all my travels mainly wildlife trips across my country, but at the moment I am confined to my home being unable to travel as I am after surgery so it will be a while before I am unable to post anything in that respect.

↑