Hey there gang.
About 2 weeks ago Andy (a volunteer from the UK with a different organization) and Leighann (a US volunteer, same org as Andy) and myself embarked on a hot, smelly and thoroughly excellent trip along the Ghanaian coast. Joining us for the first few days of the trip was Ross (the Aussie volunteer who lives in my house, also known as Rocco, Rocks, Sir Rocks).
We left Accra at around 10 in the morning on a saturday, catching local mini-buses down the coast to the town of Cape Coast. As anticipated it was stinking hot, dusty and the roads were packed and slow. Still, we made it to Cape Coast in around 4 hours. We then caught another tro-tro (local mini bus) to Kakum national park, around 1 hour from Cape Coast. Kakum is a really impressive forest, most well known for its awesome canopy walkway. We spent 1 night sleeping on platforms out in the rainforest (which was awesome), and it was during this night I found that my malaria medication makes my skin highly allergic to DEET repellent, and that Andy can say some pretty crazy stuff in his sleep. We were woken at 5:30 in the morning by Samson, our huge guide, who was to show us around the canopy walkway and forest floor before the park opened to visitors. I was really glad we did this, as we saw a lot of monkeys that only come out in mornings.
After this we headed back into Cape Coast, checked into a hotel, and then headed off to the infamous ‘Cape Coast Castle’. This is castle is really a huge fort on the cliffs on the edge of the ocean that was used hold and transport slaves for 400 years. In total around 4 million slaves passed through this castle. It was a pretty moving place to visit.
The next day we went much further down the coast, probably another 5 hours. We visited Nzulezo stilt village. This is a village built on a lake in the middle of the forest, not far from the border. People are not sure why this village was built, but legend has it that people moved there 500 years ago to escape people attacking them in Burkina Faso. To get to the village we had a 1.5 hour canoe trip through a flooded forest and across a lake. We spent a night in the guest house, went crocodile spotting at night (I didn’t see any!) and had a distillery tour in the forest the following day. It was a realy highlight of my time in Ghana.
Next we headed back towards Cape Coast, spending 4 nights staying at Brenu Beach Resort, an awesome beach and a great place to chill out. Andy and I had plenty of bruises and saw joints from getting a little to into bodysurfing in the massive waves. For 4 days we barely did anything but swim and play a very modified game of cricket.
We spent 1 night in Accra on our way back, and then arrived back in Akropong. It was a whirlwind trip, but we really did see a lot of Ghana.
|
