Sri Lanka was well known for its land based mammals being leopards, elephants and sloth bears. Yet in 2007, 2 teams in the island wanted to establish a whale watching industry that showcases Blue whales in the island. I was fortunate to lead one of them which ultimately launched whale watching back in 2008.
We then moved our focus to the East coast..being Trincomalee and found both Blue and sperm whales.. this prompted whale watching in the East in 2010 while we kept seeing massive sperm whales pods exceeding 150 whales. We then managed to attract BBC's elite Ocean team to film sperm whales in Sri Lanka for their Blue planet II production.