News
A tourist attraction sans facilities
The Horton Plains National Park remains a major tourist attraction in Sri Lanka. While visitors pay over Rs. 1,600/- to enter its precincts, the park lacks facilities such as guides and curators. The lack of this basic facility, has left many foreign tourists helpless.
Foreign tourists mill about the ticket issuing centre wasting precious time until staff arrive
Many visitors are unaware of the areas they should visit to get maximum benefit for their visit.
This lack of park curators also deprives visitors of learning the important role the plains play in bio diversity and other related information.
An additional drawback has been that quite often tourists arrive at the park early in the morning -around 4.00 am or 5.00 am- only to find they are unable to purchase tickets to enter the plains.
A common grouse, especially among foreign tourists is that they have to work according to a tight time schedule.
They complain having to spend hours to purchase tickets to enter the Horton Plains means they have to miss out on other sections of their itinerary
Blessed relief … at long last tourists are able to enter the Horton Plains National Park
Custodian of the park Piyal Ravinda said “the Horton Plains National Park attracts a large number of both foreign and local tourists and generates revenue to the country.
If we want to promote the park, many improvements have to be made”, he said. He added that they are working on a plan to provide tickets to visitors in a short period of time.
Minister of Sustainable Development and Wildlife, Gamini Jayawickrama Perera said the department was planning to set up separate ticket counters for foreign and local tourists to speed up the process. He added that other facilities for visitors would also be upgraded.
From early morning long queues of vehicles form at the entrance to the plains
From as early as 4 a.m. tourists queue up to enter the park