Is Yala National Park Worth Visiting in 2024?

Thinking of visiting Yala National Park in Sri Lanka and wondering if it’s worth it? I visited in January and my experience wasn’t quite what I was expecting. This post covers the things I liked about Yala, what I think could be improved, & my top tips if you’re planning to go

When I was planning our trip to Sri Lanka, a visit to Yala National Park was top of my list. I’d always wanted to see elephants in the wild, and with around 300 of them calling the park home, I figured Yala would be my best chance to experience it.

I had really high hopes for Sri Lanka’s most popular safari park, but due to a mixture of bad weather and overcrowding, my experience was somewhat disappointing.

In this article, I’ll go through everything you need to know about visiting Yala, including how to get there, what wildlife you can expect to see, the best time to visit and where to stay.

I’ll also summarise my experience, give you both the positives and the negatives, and help you decide whether Yala National Park is worth a visit.

A note about my trip to Yala

For full transparency, I was invited to review the newly opened Hilton Hotel, located within the park, and the safari was included as part of my stay.

As with anything I’m invited to review, I’m always completely honest about my experience, as you’ll see throughout this article.

History of Yala National Park

There’s evidence of human habitation in the area of Yala dating back to ancient times. The park is home to several archaeological sites, including Sithulpawwa, a Buddhist temple thought to have been built in the 2nd century.

Despite being designated a wildlife sanctuary in 1900, and a national park in 1938, Yala was sadly used as a hunting reserve for the wealthy when the British ruled Sri Lanka.

But these days, Yala covers a protected area of over 978 square kilometres, and since Sri Lanka gained independence in 1948, there’s been considerable conservation effort to preserve the wildlife and biodiversity of the park.

Yala National Park is undoubtedly the most popular safari park in Sri Lanka, but it’s not actually the biggest. Wilpattu holds that title, but its location away from the typical tourist trail makes it less frequented.

Where is Yala National Park?

Yala National Park is located in the southeastern part of Sri Lanka, around 4 hours from Bandaranaike International Airport in Colombo.

How to get to Yala National Park

If you’re taking a circular route around the country, I’d recommend visiting somewhere in the middle of your trip (from Ella or the South coast depending on which way you go).

Tissamaharama is the closest town to Yala, and you have the choice of public transport or Pick Me (Sri Lanka’s answer to Uber) to get you there.

From Ella

Bus | Ella – Wellawaya – Tissamaharama

*I can’t find a reliable bus timetable for Ella – Tissamaharama, and search results only show one bus at 00:30. This blog post is written by someone who took the bus, and has more information about the options available.

Pick Me | 2 hour journey time | £28/LKR 11,458

From Mirissa

Bus | Mirissa – Matara – Tissamaharama | 3 hours

Pick Me | 2 hour journey time | £37/LKR 15,157

Best time to visit Yala National Park

Whilst technically there isn’t a bad time to visit Yala, our guide informed us that your best chance of spotting wildlife is towards the end of the dry season (which runs February – July).

With the vegetation much more sparse, the animals have less food, and will venture out to the road more regularly in search of it. In the wet season, they tend to stay in the bush, where food is plentiful, making it harder to catch a glimpse of them.

The vegetation being sparse during dry season means it’s much easier to actually spot the animals too. Dense bushes and forests in the wet season make it very difficult to see across the park.

Wildlife at Yala National Park

Yala’s most renowned for its leopard population, having one of the highest concentrations of leopards in the world.

The park is also home to Asian elephants, sloth bears, spotted deer, wild boar, crocodiles, reptiles, monkeys and over 200 bird species.

Safari cost

The cost of your safari will depend on who you book with, whether you want a private or a group tour, and if you do a half or full day safari.

Every visitor to Yala has to pay an entrance fee, with foreign tourists paying a higher rate than locals. Some tours will include the entrance fee in the price, but it’s worth checking this before you book.

When selecting your tour, you’ll need to decide whether you want to go in the morning, afternoon, or for a full day.

A full day safari gives you more opportunity to spot wildlife, but the early start means you’ll need to spend the night nearby.

If you just want to do a day trip to Yala, go for an afternoon safari. They start around 2:30pm, giving you plenty of time to travel in the morning.

Expect to pay around £80/32,561 LKR for a full day safari, and £39/15,884 LKR for a half day.

What do the blocks mean?

When you arrive at Yala, you’ll hear the blocks being talked about a lot.

Yala is divided into 5 blocks, with block 1 being the most popular for safari tours, as it’s home to the highest concentration of leopards.

Depending on what you want to see, your tour might take you to a different block. If you’re mostly interested in seeing birds for example, your tour will probably take you to Block 5.

Where to stay

If you can, I’d recommend staying within the park. It’s an incredible experience to wake up in the middle of a National Park, knowing wildlife is only a short distance away.

We checked into the newly opened Hilton Yala Resort, which has 42 rooms, suites and villas, some with their own pools and hot tubs.

There’s no gates between the resort and the park, and elephants are often spotted strolling past the bedrooms, so regularly in fact, that guests are advised to always call for one of the hotel 24 hour buggy’s if they need to go anywhere.

The rooms sit amongst the trees and you’ll often see monkeys swinging between them. Look further afield and you might spot water buffalo swimming in the lake.

There’s an impressive swimming pool, spa, gym and 3 restaurants serving a selection of Sri Lankan and Western food.

My experience at Yala National Park

I visited Yala in January this year, and I was so excited to tick off a huge bucket list item of seeing animals in their natural habitat.

Unfortunately, the experience I had wasn’t the one I was expecting, for two reasons: the bad weather and too many jeeps in the park. I’ll cover them both below.

Bad weather in Yala

January is still the wet season in Yala, but unfortunately, in the weeks prior to our visit, there had been an exceptional amount of rain in Sri Lanka, causing flooding on the roads, and resulting in the park closing for several weeks.

Our visit was one of the first days after re-opening, and a lot of the roads around the park were still closed for repair, meaning that every jeep needed to take the same route through the park.

This was an unavoidable situation, but it meant that there were a lot of jeeps in one place, with little room to move. At times, we were following in a close procession that wasn’t dissimilar to a safari style zoo.

We spotted elephants from afar which was incredible, but the magic moment came right at the end of our safari when a jeep ahead of us saw a group of elephants on the side of the road.

The bad weather meant that a lot of people hadn’t seen many animals on their safari, and with the park closing, everyone was desperate to see an elephant up close before leaving.

There were about 10 cars lined up to catch a glimpse, and with several jeeps in front of us not wanting to move on, it became somewhat of a circus – drivers were flashing their lights and getting out of the jeeps to hurry the others along, all desperate to give their guests the best experience.

The park was definitely not ready to reopen, as it was clearly still recovering from the bad weather – we even saw jeeps getting stuck in the mud and having to wait to be rescued (all the while eating into their time on safari).

Too many jeeps in the park

Not only were we contending with bad weather, but there were lots of jeeps with only two people in, and grouping those people together would have halved the number of jeeps on the road, and made for a much more enjoyable experience for both animals and guests.

What I loved about Yala National Park

visiting a different block

There were of course things I loved about Yala – on our second day, we were back in the National Park to visit Sithulpawwa temple, an ancient Buddhist temple believed to have been built in the 2nd century.

Our route took us through a quieter, less popular entrance, and we only saw two other jeeps on our drive.

Although it wasn’t a game drive, we saw a tusker elephant, which are really rare in Sri Lanka (only 5% of Asian elephants have tusks).

Our second day was a much calmer experience, and more in line with what I had in mind when I thought of a safari, where we were able to observe the animals from a distance, not interrupting their natural behaviours.

the staff members

The rangers and drivers working in the park were incredible, and it’s evident how passionate they are about the animals.

Every member of staff we came across was kind and enthusiastic about their job, and we learnt so much about Yala, the animals, and the people that live in the surrounding area.

So, is Yala National Park worth visiting?

Perhaps I’m being unfair by judging the park immediately after persistent bad weather, but I’ve always vowed to give the same recommendations on here that I’d give to a friend.

And if a friend was visiting Sri Lanka and asked me whether they should go to Yala, I’d say no.

Even in the dry season, I don’t have enough confidence that the same issues with overcrowding wouldn’t be present, but I hope that if you did visit at a different time of year, you’d have a more positive experience.

If you do want to visit, there’s a few things I’d recommend:

• Visit in the dry season, where there will hopefully be more animal sightings, and less jeeps desperate for a look at one animal
• Consider choosing other blocks besides Block 1 for your tour
• Visit for at least a couple of days, so you have more chance of seeing the animals
• Consider a group tour over a private one, so you’re reducing the number of jeeps in the park

Where to go instead of Yala National Park

Instead of Yala, I’d suggest a trip to Hurulu Eco Park. It’s located 25 minutes from Sigiriya, in the central region of Sri Lanka.

We did an overnight stay in Sigiriya to climb Lion’s Rock in the morning, and booked a last minute safari in the afternoon with Minneriya Jeep Safari and Tours.

There’s lots of wildlife parks located around Sigiriya, and the company will suggest the best one for you depending on the time of year, what animals you want to see, and the weather.

Hurulu, Minneriya and Kaudulla are located next to each other, and elephants can walk between them freely. These 3 parks are especially famous for the opportunity to see large elephant herds.

Our visit to Hurulu was nothing short of magical, we paid £20 each for our a half day safari (including the park entrance fee), and we saw over 30 elephants, including a baby tusker, bull elephants and a herd.

There were far less jeeps in Hurulu which meant we could spend time observing the animals naturally.

Is Yala National Park worth visiting? Final thoughts

I never want my posts to be all doom and gloom, and I always try my best to find the positives in every situation, and there were plenty at Yala.

I hope that my experience was just down to the bad weather, but I can’t shake the feeling that the park is just unable to cope with the amount of tourism it receives.

If you’ve visited Yala I’d love to know how you found it in the comments.