Uda Walawe is the best park in Sri Lanka to watch and photograph wild elephants. Located next to the vast Uda Walawe reservoir, only a short drive from the South Coast, the park covers an area of over 30,000 hectares and consists of a mixture of scrubland and teak forest. The lack of forest in some areas is due to the extensive slash-and-burn farming that was once practised in this area. Uda Walawe became the country's fifth National Park in 1972.

The park supports approximately five hundred elephants and herds of over 50 individuals are not uncommon, the forest cover is also limited by their de-barking of the trees.

An elephant fence not only helps to keep this population away from neighbouring agricultural land but keeps domestic cattle out and protects the parks other resident mammals.