Wilpattu Revisited

 

Bar one short lifting of the curfew to allow shopping as described here, we are now three weeks in to seeing nothing more than the apartment complex where we live.  We have the apartment itself, a swimming pool, a multi-storey car park and lots of stairs for walking and I can work from a small business centre, but that’s it.  The gym was understandably closed early-on and the nearby Devi Park is just a tantalising tease.  Putting even one foot outside the complex is forbidden, and like across so much of the planet, weekend trips to the countryside are out of the question. 

Yesterday, I therefore enjoyed re-living the long weekend of 7th to 9th March when my friend Ranil and I visited Wilpattu National Park for a wildlife photography trip.  This started out as the challenge of producing a one minute video for a talent contest between friends but it quickly became apparent that three minutes was the bare minimum in order to avoid sudden curtailment just as it got going. 

I have none of my normal video editing suite with me here in Sri Lanka (just the very simple video production features of Microsoft Photos) and instead of a powerful self-built media PC only a business laptop on which I cannot install any software anyway, but wherever you are in the world and whatever the local circumstance with this pandemic, I hope you enjoy the resultant three and a half minutes escape to nature. 

Steve