Mole National Park

Trip Start Sep 28, 2005

103

Trip End Jun 24, 2006

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Where I stayed

Mole Hotel Mole National Park

(Accra hotels)

Flag of Ghana Larabanga, Ghana
Sunday, November 27, 2005

Mole National Park, 11/27

Miles Travelled: 18673

We have crossed into Ghana after leaving Burkina Faso. Due to some delays with getting visas, and a long process to cross the border, we had to bush camp for two nights on our way from Ouagadougou to Mole. Plus, with the lack of street signs, our drivers somehow ended up on the wrong road to the border and so we reached the border about 100 km away from where we intended. But, eventually, we did make it to Mole. It's nice being in an English-speaking country again after attempting to communicate in French for the past 4 weeks. We can read the signs now!

Ghana uses the "Cedi" currency, so we exchanged some money

01 Commuters

. However, there are around 9000 cedis to the dollar, and the largest bill is 20,000 cedis, so we have to carry large wads of bills around. It was even more amusing when our tour leader exchanged money in order to buy food and provisions -- he exchanged over $1000, and so we had to spend half an hour just helping count the cedis to make sure we weren't getting cheated (see picture).

Mole is Ghana's best national park, and has many of the "big game" species in Africa. But, it's definitely not Kenya or Botswana, so wildlife viewing isn't all that great.

At 3:30pm (what feels like the peak of the heat) we gather together for a game walk. Five of us along with an armed ranger head down from the hotel's overlook escarpment into the bush to see what wildlife we can see. It's hot and humid, the sweat just drips down the side of our face and down the back of our necks making us feel sticky all over.

A large family (about 20 or 30) of baboons cross in front of us and we end up having a staring contest with a few. Some of the young were clutching onto their mom for a free ride. Shortly afterwards we came across two little red monkeys doing their daily routine

02 Counting cash

. We watched them while they combed through their hair, ate leaves and made faces at us. On further we saw a large heard of timid antelope. One glance at us and they quickly ran off.

Off in the distance we could see dark clouds gathering and hear thunder cracking in the distance but we kept on with our walk. We started walking through a partially dried mud area with lots of little footprints of antelope and then there were some really BIG footprints. Nathan and I could get all 4 of our feet in this one impression. All the sudden the wind started to pick up, we could smell the rain in the air and then small drops of rain were coming down. It was apparent that it would not be long till the clouds let loose so our guide picked up the pace back to the hotel. Our group's single file line was thinning out as the guide walked faster through the bush. I turned around to see where Nathan was. He was some distance behind me with his camera perched at his eye and I had to ask my self what is he photographing, now that it is starting to rain and the rest of the group is walking away. Then I looked into the direction where his camera was pointing and there he (or she) was walking past. Mr. Elephant was maybe 30 yards away but he still looked big. I tried to call out to the rest of the group that was ahead of us but one of the rules about the animals is that you should not talk or yell around them, so I was unable to get their attention

03 Water hole

. So I went back to watching Mr. Elephant. He turned to look at us then, gracefully walked on by. It was such a beautiful moment with the wind gently stirring, light rain trickling and a pre-sunset glow while watching this impressive animal stroll past. Once he disappeared behind a tree into the sunset we walked in the direction the others went. We were quickly in thicker bush following the elephant's old footsteps, but there was not a sign of the others. By now the elephant was way out of range so I started to yell, "hello, where are you" they yell back "over by the big tree" (like that's going to help). We keep yelling back in forth with our banter of "hello" till we reached the others and then proudly told them what they missed.

The Mole Motel (great name) is where we're staying and it has a POOL! Aside from the game walks, we've just been relaxing by the pool and doing some reading. It's a welcome change from being on the road, in a hurry, or bush camping with no running water.