Tony Cape Coast
Well, this one is going to be long. It covers Thursday night to Sunday.
On Thursday, Martin and I decided to stay in Kumasi as our bus left for Cape Coast at 4 AM. We went to this really nice Indian restaurant and paid about 10 times what a plate of fried rice and chicken would cost. It was worth it. We played a bit of pool there and then went to this little spot near our hostel and had a bit too much of the local gin. This place was literally a shack. It had three benches, a fridge and a shelf. The locals were somewhat surprised to see two obrunis there.
Getting up at 3:30 was a bit of a pain, but we made our bus and got into Cape Coast around 7. Fortunately, the place we were staying let us check in, so we crashed til about noon. We then wandered into town, grabbing a burger (the first good one I’ve had here) at this beautiful restaurant on the beach.
After that, we went to Cape Coast Castle. It’s hard to know what to make of it. The building is pretty impressive, but the history behind it is horrifying. At one point, the tour guide shut us in the “condemned cell”—a room without windows where insubordinate prisoners were put to die. There were two interesting museums within the fort, both of which were surprisingly detailed. After that, we wandered around Cape Coast for a while, climbing up a hill to this small fort that was a lookout for the British. When we got there, some youth stopped us on the path and demanded money for a development fee. This is a common occurrence (Ghana seems to be one big shakedown), but I can actually say we got our money’s worth. We got an informative guide and then sat down with this man who had been a lecturer at Cape Coast University, but then went blind, so he started a school for the blind and deaf. He gave us a really informative history of the region, so the initial annoyance at what seemed like yet another way to get money from foreigners quickly dissipated.
We didn’t do anything on Friday night, other than eat too many kebabs. We got up early on Saturday morning to go to Kakum National Park, about an hour from Cape Coast. Although our taxi driver from the guesthouse to the tro-tro station told us that we would have to wait five hours for a tro-tro so we should pay him to drive us, there was one waiting when we got to the station. What a surprise. We were there over an hour before the park opened, but they let us in early anyways, along with two Americans, a Brit, and a French guy. The main attraction is this canopy walk, suspended 40 metres above ground. It was amazing, especially because we had it to ourselves and could take our time, watching monkeys jumping around in the distance. It was incredible.
The French guy and the Brit had a car and wanted to go hiking in the park and they invited us, so our guide arranged for us to meet up with some rangers at the other end of the park. Some forest elephants had been damaging crops on the edge of the park a few days before, so we followed their tracks. Although we didn’t see any elephants, it was great. We got to do something that very few tourists do, traipsing through dense rainforest with two armed guides in the middle of nowhere. At one point we came to this river and the wardens piggybacked us across, which was fairly guilt-inducing but I’m glad I did it anyways. We also got attacked by ants at one point. When we got out, one warden let me hold his gun for a photo! Tony the Great White Hunter.
We made our way back to Cape Coast with our two new friends. It was nice to be in a private car again. We went back to the same restaurant as before and three of us had a good meal. Jeremy (the French guy) ordered lobster and some of the meat tasted like it had been marinated in diesel. All I could think of was Trailer Park Boys. The concept of the customer always being right doesn’t exactly exist here. It was pretty funny to watch a French guy arguing with Ghanaians about food.
After that, we went swimming. I have never been in a more powerful sea. Some of the waves were at least six feet, but what was most powerful was the undertow. It was so much fun, bodysurfing and getting tossed around for a while. Jeremy and Matthew left us to go to some wildlife reserve near Cote D’Ivoire, so Martin and I just went to this beach resort and had a couple of beers. It turned out that an Ashanti Dance Group was performing there, which was great. It did feel a bit staged, but was impressive nonetheless. People here are incredibly athletic—they went on for ages.
Sunday morning: we went to the bus station early to try and get tickets for the afternoon bus. However, their system doesn’t really take reservations, so we got stuck taking the early one, which was disappointing. It would have been great to hit the beach again.
That’s really all. I’m back home now. It was an incredible weekend and it’s too bad that Martin is leaving for good in December. I’ve got the numbers of the other guys we met and if the timing is right, we’re going to go up to Mole in January. The Habs won (finally). At least they’ve been managing to lose in OT a lot, so they are simply treading water. Hopefully a full week off will do them good. I’m flying home next Wednesday, but am probably going to Accra on Monday, so this is my last week before Christmas. I really want to get some stuff sorted out with the newspaper before I leave, but we’ll see. The pace here, although usually pretty enjoyable, doesn’t exactly work if you are on a tight schedule. One last thing. I saved all the emails I’ve received recently to a disc today in Kumasi but I forgot the disk there. So replies are going to have to wait one more day. Sorry for that. And the length of this.
On Thursday, Martin and I decided to stay in Kumasi as our bus left for Cape Coast at 4 AM. We went to this really nice Indian restaurant and paid about 10 times what a plate of fried rice and chicken would cost. It was worth it. We played a bit of pool there and then went to this little spot near our hostel and had a bit too much of the local gin. This place was literally a shack. It had three benches, a fridge and a shelf. The locals were somewhat surprised to see two obrunis there.
Getting up at 3:30 was a bit of a pain, but we made our bus and got into Cape Coast around 7. Fortunately, the place we were staying let us check in, so we crashed til about noon. We then wandered into town, grabbing a burger (the first good one I’ve had here) at this beautiful restaurant on the beach.
After that, we went to Cape Coast Castle. It’s hard to know what to make of it. The building is pretty impressive, but the history behind it is horrifying. At one point, the tour guide shut us in the “condemned cell”—a room without windows where insubordinate prisoners were put to die. There were two interesting museums within the fort, both of which were surprisingly detailed. After that, we wandered around Cape Coast for a while, climbing up a hill to this small fort that was a lookout for the British. When we got there, some youth stopped us on the path and demanded money for a development fee. This is a common occurrence (Ghana seems to be one big shakedown), but I can actually say we got our money’s worth. We got an informative guide and then sat down with this man who had been a lecturer at Cape Coast University, but then went blind, so he started a school for the blind and deaf. He gave us a really informative history of the region, so the initial annoyance at what seemed like yet another way to get money from foreigners quickly dissipated.
We didn’t do anything on Friday night, other than eat too many kebabs. We got up early on Saturday morning to go to Kakum National Park, about an hour from Cape Coast. Although our taxi driver from the guesthouse to the tro-tro station told us that we would have to wait five hours for a tro-tro so we should pay him to drive us, there was one waiting when we got to the station. What a surprise. We were there over an hour before the park opened, but they let us in early anyways, along with two Americans, a Brit, and a French guy. The main attraction is this canopy walk, suspended 40 metres above ground. It was amazing, especially because we had it to ourselves and could take our time, watching monkeys jumping around in the distance. It was incredible.
The French guy and the Brit had a car and wanted to go hiking in the park and they invited us, so our guide arranged for us to meet up with some rangers at the other end of the park. Some forest elephants had been damaging crops on the edge of the park a few days before, so we followed their tracks. Although we didn’t see any elephants, it was great. We got to do something that very few tourists do, traipsing through dense rainforest with two armed guides in the middle of nowhere. At one point we came to this river and the wardens piggybacked us across, which was fairly guilt-inducing but I’m glad I did it anyways. We also got attacked by ants at one point. When we got out, one warden let me hold his gun for a photo! Tony the Great White Hunter.
We made our way back to Cape Coast with our two new friends. It was nice to be in a private car again. We went back to the same restaurant as before and three of us had a good meal. Jeremy (the French guy) ordered lobster and some of the meat tasted like it had been marinated in diesel. All I could think of was Trailer Park Boys. The concept of the customer always being right doesn’t exactly exist here. It was pretty funny to watch a French guy arguing with Ghanaians about food.
After that, we went swimming. I have never been in a more powerful sea. Some of the waves were at least six feet, but what was most powerful was the undertow. It was so much fun, bodysurfing and getting tossed around for a while. Jeremy and Matthew left us to go to some wildlife reserve near Cote D’Ivoire, so Martin and I just went to this beach resort and had a couple of beers. It turned out that an Ashanti Dance Group was performing there, which was great. It did feel a bit staged, but was impressive nonetheless. People here are incredibly athletic—they went on for ages.
Sunday morning: we went to the bus station early to try and get tickets for the afternoon bus. However, their system doesn’t really take reservations, so we got stuck taking the early one, which was disappointing. It would have been great to hit the beach again.
That’s really all. I’m back home now. It was an incredible weekend and it’s too bad that Martin is leaving for good in December. I’ve got the numbers of the other guys we met and if the timing is right, we’re going to go up to Mole in January. The Habs won (finally). At least they’ve been managing to lose in OT a lot, so they are simply treading water. Hopefully a full week off will do them good. I’m flying home next Wednesday, but am probably going to Accra on Monday, so this is my last week before Christmas. I really want to get some stuff sorted out with the newspaper before I leave, but we’ll see. The pace here, although usually pretty enjoyable, doesn’t exactly work if you are on a tight schedule. One last thing. I saved all the emails I’ve received recently to a disc today in Kumasi but I forgot the disk there. So replies are going to have to wait one more day. Sorry for that. And the length of this.
posted by Tony at 5:56 p.m.
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