Ethical tourism
Taking a trip to Sri Lanka in 2019, I wanted to see wildlife but was adamant with the holiday company that I was not interested in any excursions that involved animal exploitation or captivity. The company immediately recommended a safari with a chance of seeing wild Asian elephants in a national park, and I gladly accepted.
The safari started with a glimpse of elephants feeding about 200m away, easily watched with binoculars from a lone vehicle hidden on a quiet track. This moment was incredible and one I’ll remember forever.
However, what came later would be remembered for the wrong reasons. The next group of elephants found was surrounded by more than 60 vehicles, all jostling for position in the exhaust fumes. The elephants wanted to cross the track but were blocked and hassled at every opportunity.
Our guide was shocked when I demanded that we be taken back to the hotel half a day early with no further elephant viewing. I felt complicit in a terrible cruelty and vowed never again to pay money for wildlife tourism, unless I knew that the wildlife would be a chance encounter, admired at a distance.
I took this photo (left) of the elephants but what you cannot see is the Londonesque traffic in the national park! Richard Dowling, Kent