The following route works fine:
Route::get('/{category}/{product?}/{id?}',array('uses' => 'ProductController@index'));

so all the following url's gets me back my views correctly:
localhost:8000/bookstall/
localhost:8000/bookstall/cds
localhost:8000/bookstall/cds/1234

I am trying to write a api route which returns json response with same route as below:
Route::get('/api/v1/{category}/{product?}/{id?}',array('uses' => 'ProductApiController@index'));

so have these route url's that behave differently:
localhost:8000/api/v1/bookstall/ - This returns 404 page not found
localhost:8000/api/v1/bookstall/cds - This works
localhost:8000//api/v1/bookstall/cds/1234 - This works

Not sure why I am getting 404 page not found in the second API route when a similar route works in the first case. Anything I am missing?