Walk on the Wild Side

One of our faculty friends, Stuart, had wanted to get out of the Accra area, so he got some of us together, and we hired a car to drive us up the Cape Coast.  We left at 6 am to beat the traffic and get to our destination before it was too hot.  Ghanians seem to rise early  to beat the heat as well.

Our driver knew all the back roads through Accra, so we saw some new sights. As you can see from the picture above, this village was full of bread.  It is renowned for the water that is used to make the bread, and there were literally hundred of stands of bread.  We passed loaves of bread in all the towns as they were being packaged by the side of the road for sale.

There were still Obama billboards from his visit.  They love Obama here as they have in most places that we have visited. We've encountered so many people who ask where we are from and when we tell them, they say "Obama".  We're fortunate for the goodwill his presidency has created throughout all the countries on this voyage.

Kids were arriving at schools early.
All the kids here wear uniforms to school, and in most places, there are not enough classrooms, so they go to school in two shifts.  We watched a video clip last night that one of our students had taken of a 4 year old who knew her multiplication table for 2 times.  They are bright and eager to learn.

Our ultimate destination was Kakum National Park which was about 3 hours away from the ship.  This is a tropical rain forest of many species of old trees and the possibility of seeing animals. One of the main draws of the forest is the canopy walkway which is a series of swinging bridges connected at platforms at the top of huge trees.  All six of us adults decided to take "the walk", and it was terrifying with the height and swaying of the bridges. I was relieved when the last one was the shortest walk and stepped up my adrenaline rush by walking the last half without holding on (besides my hands were sore from the death grip I had been using).

It was a good thing we had started early, because we were already soaking wet from the exertion. We still had enough stamina to talk the guided nature walk where our guide described trees and plants, including a tree whose bark is said to produce the same results as Viagra.

Back at the entrance, we watched a school group and then ran into the expected gaggle of SASers.  Some of them had come up to the area the previous day and made friends who gave them a place to spend the night.  They even got to go to the stockyard the next morning, so they got a good flavor for the life.

After a lunch of fish and  French fries at a resort along the beach, we went to the Cape Coast Castle. We were besieged by kids as we got out of the car.  They all wanted to sell us something or get us to pledge money to their school.  Inside, we had a guided tour with a very knowledgeable guide.  The Castle was used extensively in the slave trade, and we saw where so much inhumanity took place.  It was a sobering way to actually feel some history as we walked in the rooms where humans were kept as captives and lived in their own filth waiting to see which ones were strong enough to survive.

The town around the castle is a fishing village and is quite poor but thriving and beautiful in its own way.

We were physically and emotionally exhausted, so we headed back to the ship, unfortunately at rush hour where we arrived with 2 min to spare before the dining room was closed.