Golden Tulip Accra

... difficult, so we didn't get to do everything we had hoped, but whilst stuck in various small villages, waiting for transport, we had a few nice chances to meet the locals and see a slower pace of life. The area is dense green jungle with valleys and waterfalls. We visited 2 waterfalls, including Wli Falls - the highest in West Africa. We actually stayed within sight of these falls, in the town of Wli, at a great lodge run by a lovely German couple. It was a nice, quiet, relaxing ...

... COME.  We stayed out until 4am when the bus took us back to the port. I had to be up at 5:30AM for my trip to Kakum National Park.


Day 4 Kakum National Park/Elmina Castle and Slave Dungeons


It was a 4 hour bus ride to the middle of the rainforest. We hiked and got to the famous "canopy walk". It was like I was in the Jungle Book. We walked across a canopy (literally a wooden plank with netting around it) 130 ft in the air. Frightening. They claim that ...

... apparently even Mohammed Ali failed), and generally enjoyed being away from Accra for a while. It takes 4-6 hours to get there or back, so we took our time over the weekend.

I'm a little vague tonight - there is so much I would love to tell you all about, that I can't think where to start. The weather is constantly hot and sticky and it's very dusty, but everyone is very clean here, with families sweeping literally the whole house, including the dirt road out front, every ...

... is what i am into...but i found myself more interested in ghanaian social institutions after this weekend. When we were in the volta region, we were traveling with our tour guide's grandson who is 8 years old named stephen. On saturday night, we were outside the gates of our hotel playing with some local children, dancing and playing drums, and next thing i knew, stephen was punching one of the kids. It was really sudden so we separated them and asked ...

... Uncle Sulley and I met in Achimota because he lost track of time and was late. I had a great security guard. Aunty Beatrice’s son, Kwame, walked with me to the taxi station and took a picture of the driver (the driver didn’t even notice!), and then a picture of the license plate (See Mom, they’re taking good care of me). Anyway, I took the taxi to Achimota, and from there we took a tro-tro to Tema. When we got to Tema, we asked a guy for directions to the place where Adom ...

... cellars in which slaves were crammed for months, were chilling reminders of the unreasonable treatment of their African ancestors.
After a couple more days at a Brenu beach resort, where I devoured a delicious garlic butter lobster, we continued east along the coast to Cape Coast. My birthday was spent checking out Cape Coast in the morning, then being scared senseless whilst undertaking a rainforest canopy walk in Kakum National Park (I didn't quite trust the ...

... warm that it is humbling. I have learned so much from ev**yone- my CIEE friends, my roommate, my *****ian and Ghanaian friends in my dorm, and the various children and people you meet ev**ywh**e you go. I am looking forward to studying for my finals but I have already learned so much more- about myself, the world, people in gen**al, that my exp**ience h**e feels complete. Life h**e is at a much diff**ent pace- things c**tainly seem disorganized at times, but it is ...

... Let me just say I managed to get slippers made in Ghana in size 44, almost crippled myself in Italy having bought a pair of men's shoes in Rome which chose to give out on me at an official dinner and I had to hobble home and then I promptly forgot them in Rome (Freud would have a field day) so I had to buy a pair of men's moccasins in Uganda so that I could grace Amsterdam with a modicum of respectability.  Let me state here that I hate closed shoes! 

... att folket i Ghana garna tar pa varandra, aven framande manniskor men tar dom oss pa brosten sa ska vi sla dom i ansiktet, det ar en viktig signal till alla som ser att vi ar bra manniskor. Man friar som en oppningsfras for att lara kanna oss och ursakter som pojkvanner mm biter inte pa en kille fran Ghana. Hon hade mycket spannande saker att beratta kan jag lova. Mandag em tillbringades pa stranden, inte helt fel ...