this is bbc news, the headlines: sri lanka's president gotabaya rajapaksa will step down after protesters stormed the palace and set fire to the prime minister's house. hundreds of thousands of demonstrators descended on the capital colombo after months of protests over economic mismanagement. sri lanka is suffering high inflation and is struggling to import food, fuel and medicine. as japan grieves for the former prime minister shinzo abe, voting begins in elections for the upper house of parliament, two days after his death. there are suggestions his murder could boost support for the governing liberal democratic party, of which mr abe was the leading statesman. the uk chancellor nadhim zahawi has added his name to

the conservative leadership contest, joining a field of eight people, including two former health secretaries, sajid javid and jeremy hunt. the current favourite is the former chancellor rishi sunak, who resigned from his post on tuesday. now on bbc news, the travel show. this week on the travel show — i'm in the great american outdoors for a close encounter with some grizzly bears. we're heading to australia to wish a very happy birthday to one of the most iconic bridges in the world. and in mexico, we meet the people breathing life into an ancient ballgame that predates football by around 3,000 years.

hello, and welcome to yellowstone park here in the united states. this is one of the oldest national parks in the world. it celebrates its 150th this year. now, this is a vast and mesmerising place. a little later on in the show i will be coming up close to one of yellowstone�*s most famous and fearsome residents — the grizzly bear. but we're starting this week somewhere where you definitely won't need bear spray to visit. now, the famous film director baz luhrmann once said if paris is the city of light, then sydney is the city of fireworks. that is certainly the case every new year's eve when the global party really gets started with pictures

like these beamed around the world from sydney harbour bridge. but this year, it's the bridge itself that's celebrating its 90th anniversary. and we've been to wish it a very happy birthday. the best place to appreciate the size of the sydney harbour bridge is to stand right underneath it. i'm at milsons point on the north side of sydney harbour. the bridge stretches 503 metres across to dawes point on the south side and it weighs an extraordinary 52,000 tons. it was made 90 years ago, but it's still one of the biggest bridges in the world, it is just extraordinary. archive: his majesty's message is as follows, i have learned with great pleasure that the sydney

harbour bridge has now been completed. cheering. i cross the bridge twice a day, going to and from work, and ijust love it. it doesn't matter whether the peak hour traffic is banged up or not, because the slower the traffic the more time you have to appreciate the bridge as you go over it. it's just a wonderful structure. here we are, we are going under the structure now, and you just see the unfolding series of girders, it is just beautiful. there is track north and south for trains, there are i think three, four... eight lanes of traffic. two of those take up what used to be tram lanes.

the sydney harbour bridge gave sydney, and actually australia, a very identifiable icon, a bit like the eiffel towerfor paris or big ben for london. you could immediately recognise with one graphic image that this was sydney, sydney harbour, or australia. whereas before it was just flocks of sheep that signified australia. archive: words are futile things with which to describe the might and majesty of this wonderful structure, even pictures can hardly do itjustice. the sydney harbour bridge represents modern australia, and has done since it was built in 1932. the first big celebration of white australia if you like, was in 1938, 150 years since governor phillip turned up with the first fleet. the bridge was there in posters and souvenirs and all the rest.

black australia had been here for many thousands of years, their world had been turned upside down. it never gets old. this is amazing. i'm a tour guide at sydney, at bridge climb. i do all kinds of tours. i'm not sure how fast the wind is, but it's blowing a gale. you can see everything, that of the best part about this bridge, you see a 360 view of sydney, my favourite viewing is bennelong point where the opera house sits. i do a special tour called the burrawa, which means upwards above, i get to explore, take people up on this iconic bridge and take them back 230 years ago, pre—colonisation.

230 years ago, the first fleet arrived right here in the harbour. 1788, we had 11 large ships, big white sails, captained by arthur phillip bringing with him what we know as australia today. just an abundance of convicts. when the first fleet arrived, it did bring disease and unfortunately they did wipe out more than 70% of the indigenous people here in australia. unfortunately, when i was in school, and i've only been out of school for 11 years, i was never taught any of the indigenous history. i feel like that was a lot throughout the older generations as well. luckily, today we do have a coming into our school curriculum which is perfect,

it is all we really want. in 2000, the bridge became a symbol of something quite different, because thousands of people walked across it in a walk for reconciliation, and the bridge symbolised the spanning of the gulf between black and white australia, troubled waters and all the rest of it. it became a wonderful symbol of reconciliation, whereas once it had symbolised something that was quite exclusive. this is the aboriginal flag created by harold thomas injuly 1971. the flag represents three elements of aboriginal culture, the black is for the people, the aboriginal people of this land. the red is the earth, or the sacred ochre that is used in ceremony. and the yellow is the sun, the giver of life.

the flag represents the sovereignty of aboriginal people on aboriginal land. i think over many years there has been a movement that the sydney harbour bridge should fly the flag 365 days of the year and notjust one week during reconciliation week or naidoc week. this land always was and always will be aboriginal land. i think importantly it will show that the history of this country, the history of the continent dates back to over 65,000 years, and notjust the 253 years since the arrival of captain cook. that report there from what truly has to be one of my favourite cities in the world. and if you are heading there, here are things we think you should look out for. where better to host one of the world's largest boat shows that in a city known for its harbour? over the course of five days from 28july to 1 august,

the sydney international boat show will provide a line—up of entertainment and events, with something for everyone to enjoy. with over 240 exhibitors, up to 900 boats and probably thousands of pairs of deck shoes, expect to see the finest in marine tech. from super yachts to paddle boards. if you want to stay off the water or cannot afford a million dollar boat, maybe the sydney fringe festival is one for you. throughout the whole of september, cultural creators will come together to present a50 events, hosted by 70 unique and emerging venues throughout the greater sydney area. expect music, comedy, dance, and genre—defying performances in one of australia's largest independent arts festivals. and if city life gets a bit much, then the blue mountains are only two hours' drive from sydney. you'll find ancient aboriginal

art nestled within this craggy sandstone ridged wilderness and an abundance of walking trails will take you into the heart of the mountain range. or, if you are feeling less energetic you can glide past the iconic rock formations on the 545 metre scenic cable way. still to come on the travel show — we head to mexico for a ballgame that was first played around 3000 years ago. and i get some tips on how to deal with an encounter with a grizzly bear in america's vast yellowstone national park. one of this year's big sporting events will undoubtedly be the fifa world cup, that kicks off in qatar in november. but over in mexico, playing a much older ball game that predates soccer by 3000 years

and we've been to meet some of the star players.

i'm in montana, a huge state in the great american west and home to one of the gateways to the country's oldest national park, yellowstone. the park attracts millions of visitors each year and one of its main draws are potential bear sightings. driving along, just saw loads of people parked up, looking in a certain direction. i asked them what they've seen and right over there in the distance is a grizzly bear! from what i understand, it's quite rare to spot a grizzly in the wild, so this is a very special moment. i mean, this is why you come

to yellowstone, right? the bear is yellowstone�*s unofficial symbol but it wasn't too long ago that visitors and the park service alike like took a very different approach to these furry fellas. file: by the late 1800s, | bears had figured out that where there were people, there was food. for the next 80 years, a hallmark of every yellowstone visit was looking for bears begging along the roadside or watching them feed on food scraps at the i hotel garbage dumps. thanks to research, we've come a long way since then. while close encounters are rare, with over 700 bears in an area that is becoming increasingly populated, it's important to be prepared. randy! hi. hello. good to meet you. randy runs courses in bear safety, but he does not work alone. ok! this is the bear?

yep. talk to me about how you use this to teach people about their safety. well, if you're not able to avoid an encounter with a bear, bear spray is the most effective thing you can use to change a bear�*s behaviour. if you get this hot pepper oil that's in this container into their face, they're going to forget about you and forget that you might be a threat to them and they're going to want to go somewhere else. most of the encounters we have with grizzly bears around here, they're defensive encounters, so they're going to growl, they're going to drool, they'll huff and make different noises, they'll pound on the ground. so, it's good to have this strapped on your belt at all times? yes, �*cause things happen really fast. the nice thing about this trading device is it goes about 20 miles an hour. a real bear does about 35 miles an hour, which is quite fast. very fast! so, this really gives people an idea about how quick they have to be to get their bear spray out, the safety off and deploy it. i have no idea they even move that fast. oh, yes! alright, we've assessed what the bear�*s doing. looks like he's gonna charge.

we've stood our ground. we've got our spray out. yes. time to take the safety off and when he comes, spray down in front of him. do a couple of seconds bursts until he changes his behaviour. gotcha. alright, here he comes. even though i know that's a mechanical bear, i was like whew! it gets your blood flowing. 0ne things for sure is that i shouldn't need my spray where i'm going next. down the road, a group of dedicated individuals are working on methods to decrease the amount of bear encounters in the area with the help of the bears themselves. keeping bears away from food ultimately helps keep the bears away from people, so when camping, it's so important to stash your food safely. now, here on the outskirts of yellowstone, they're

actually testing the sturdiness of food containers by putting them up against actual bears. and, uh, needless to say, these ones didn't quite pass the test. we've put some dog biscuits in there so that it rattles around. there's peanut butter in there and there's actually an old fish in as well. it's got to withstand 60 minutes of direct contact from the bears. wow! but if it does, it can be certified as bear—resistant by the interagency grizzly bear committee. so you can see... look at those claw marks! obviously, it's gotten some attention from the bear. yeah! teeth or claw marks here. they're pretty deep. teeth marks. so, tell me, where did these bears come from? grant is actually from yellowstone national park. coram is from glacier national park. so, they were wild bears that got into trouble with people. that doesn't just happen out of the blue. it really happens when bears get food rewards, and his last act as a wild bear was to climb into somebody�*s vehicle... oh, my god.

..in their own driveway in the middle of the day while they were trying to unload their groceries. sadly, not all of the mischievous bears can be rehomed here and around a0 are put down each year. so, in the case of the eight grizzly bears that live here at the grizzly & wolf discovery center, we've provided an alternative but maybe, you know, even more importantly, we give visitors to the area a chance to learn from their stories. even though they're still getting into conflict with people over food, the population is much more stable than it has been in the past and a lot of that is because of what we've learned about how important it is in bear country to be careful with our food and techniques we have, like bear—resistant containers for securing that food. so, i've seen a live bear, i've seen a remote—controlled bear. believe it or not, next up, i'm going to see a defrosting bear. hello! welcome aboard! thank you. this is the draper specimen preparation lab.

it is an extension of the natural history museum itself. today, we're going to be working on a grizzly bear. what are we doing here? "the most fun part ever," said no—one. we are going to remove the organs. i've done really well up until this point but i think i might have to walk away in a moment. as well as bears, corey and his team of volunteers preserve birds, wildcats and thousands more species. an average specimen that comes into the museum, we collect data with it. so, we collect a gps co—ordinate, and that gives us the exact location at the time of collection. it gives us things like habitat information, things like elevation and so, as things shift and change, these become snapshots in time. yellowstone, the greater yellowstone ecosystem, has the complete complement of wildlife that was here pre—european colonisation — and we can't say that about a lot of places in the world. as the grizzly bear

in particular begins to recover into its historic range, it's going to come into conflict and come into contact with people. back outside, i catch up with randy to get some final advice. so, i've got a few days left here, so what are your top tips to help me stay safe? so, number one is use avoidance techniques — you know, make noise, travel in groups, carry bear spray, just be really aware. number two, if you do see a bear, you don't ever run. you stand your ground and maybe get your bear spray out, just in case. i'll be ready. and you've got to see what the bear is going to do. if the bear doesn't see you, you can leave. don't bring a bunch of attention to yourself, just take off while the bear is not looking. if the bear does see you, don't start waving your hands — "hey, bear," — don't do any of that because a bear could actually perceive that as a threat. yeah. so, try to see what the bear is going to do. if they get defensive and make a lot of noise,

like kind of how we described with the charging trainer, that's when your bear spray comes into play. yeah. butjust awareness is key. being armed with the knowledge of how to look after yourself if a potential encounter happens. all right. i'm ready. very good tips, randy. thank you. you got it. next week, we're in senegal as the world's biggest hospital ship prepares to embark on its first—ever mission... ifeel like i'm in a hospital but it's strange because when you're walking on the floor, of course, we're not on land and you get the odd movement every so often. ..and emmaline's on board to meet the travelling volunteers helping to make it happen. we have, like, 30—a0 nationalities on the ship, so the ship on itself is a travel — is a journey through all different cultures. we're always posting on instagram and facebook, too, so make sure you check us out there. all you've got to do is search "bbc travel show".

until next time, i'm off to — very carefully — make friends with some more grizzlies. see you next time. hello. very little rain in this forecast — but there is heat to talk about. and in fact, as temperatures head up during sunday, parts of wales, the wider area of england, begin three consecutive days with temperatures in the mid—to—upper 20s, some spots low 30s, which will qualify it as a heat wave right underneath this area of high pressure. there will be cloud to begin with, though, misty low cloud into northern ireland, western scotland, parts of northwest england, north wales. a lot of that's going to disappear and mayjust linger around some irish sea coasts, far northwest

scotland staying cloudy, in the northern isles, rain clearing away from shetland. for many, though, it'sjust a case of plenty of sunshine, mid—to—low 20s, the warmest parts of northern ireland through eastern scotland, mid—to—high 20s, much of wales and england, 30 in southeast england, somewhat cooling sea breezes around the coasts. it's going to be a hot one on centre court — and notjust wimbledon players and spectators will need to protect against the strong sunshine with high, or indeed, very high uv levels. sunday evening, well, stays fine, very warm, bit of misty low cloud returning towards northwest scotland and maybe still around some irish sea coasts going into monday morning. 0vernight temperatures mid—to—low teens, but the nights are getting a bit warmer, as well. then during monday, there will be a bit more cloud filtering into scotland and northern ireland, though it will still feel very warm with some sunny spells. an increasing breeze and some rain, some rain heading into the western isles later in the day. for wales and england the sun will turn hazy, but it will still be there and it'll feel hotter. more places getting to that 30 or above celsius mark.

and then, going into tuesday, there's a cold front that's moving its way southwards, but it will have barely any rain once it moves through scotland and northern ireland, and it willjust be a band of cloud, really. so behind it for scotland and northern ireland, feeling fresher on tuesday, some sunny spells the chance of a shower. although there will be some cloud filtering through wales and england, it will still feel very warm or indeed hot in places, and in fact could well be a hotter day still on tuesday in southeast england into the low 30s before then. just turns a touch cooler going into wednesday. in fact, for the rest of the week, scotland and northern ireland temperatures in some spots below average for the time of year. it will stay very warm across southern areas, and there is the potential for another burst of heat, maybe extreme heat, into next weekend, which we are watching.

welcome to bbc news. i'm gareth barlow. our top stories... sri lanka's president gotabaya rajapaksa will step down after protesters stormed the palace and set fire to the prime minister's house. we report from the scene in colombo. these protesters want a new beginning for sri lanka, a new political culture so that they will not face a similar economic crisis in this country. as japan grieves for the former prime minister shinzo abe, voting begins in elections for the upper house of parliament. the uk chancellor nadim zahawi has added his name to the conservative leadership contest — joining a field of eight, including sajid javid and jeremy hunt. and in the tennis, moscow—born elena rybakina

wins the women's singles title, representing kazakhastan.