I can't believe I will be in America in just a few days! This has been an amazing, eye-opening, invaluable experience...but I do feel ready to get back to the comforts of home (and start making money, as I am completely broke now).
On Saturday, Sarah and I met at 7:30 to begin our trip out to Nzulezo, the stilt village. We took a tro-tro from Cape Coast to Takoradi, which took an hour and a half because of traffic. Then we made our way to another tro-tro which went straight from Takoradi to Beyin, where the canoes launch. Unfortunately we waited almost two hours for that tro-tro to fill and spent another two hours careening over potholes and speedbumps at a frightening clip. Finally we reached Beyin, paid our fees to the Ghana Wildlife Society (7 cedis for volunteers, 1.5 cedis per camera to be used), and got into our canoes. The boatride to the village was beautiful. Because it's the dry season, the water is too shallow in many points to paddle; instead, the guides use poles to push the canoe along like gondoliers. We traveled along one waterway, which opened onto a small lake, then along another waterway which finally deposited us onto the main lake. We paddled across to the stilt village.
The history as told to us by our guides was that the original settlers came from Mali, where they were attacked relentlessly, in the 1400s. After so many displacements due to these attacks, the people decided God was telling them never to settle on land. Instead, they migrated until they found this particular lake and built the village on stilts. It is made mostly of bamboo and raffia, with some wooden planks forming the main walkway between houses. They have their own churches (4), schools, stores, medicine, etc. Anytime they want to go somewhere, they have to paddle in dugout canoes and back. The population is somewhere between 400 and 500 people. The only power comes from car batteries. They have one speedboat for emergency use only; because the surrounding area of the Amansuri Wetlands is protected, motorboats are generally forbidden because of the pollution they cause. Most of their money comes from farming nearby lands, but they also fish some.
Unfortunately, our trip was somewhat clouded by intense pressure to donate to the chief and to tip the boatmen. Considering we already paid 8.25 each just to get there and take some pictures (not of the people, they don't like it), I was a bit turned off by these inducements.
Getting back to Cape Coast was incredibly difficult. We were instructed to take a tro-tro to a certain village, get off, and wait for another that would take us straight to Takoradi. As soon as we disembarked and the bus drove off, we were told that there would be no more tro-tros to Takoradi that day. So we hired a private car to take us 20 minutes to another village, where there was a bus to Takoradi waiting. Between traffic and the constant stopping to let passengers on and off, the ride took almost 3 hours. Once we got to Takoradi, we had to wait another hour for a tro-tro to Cape Coast, which took almost 2 hours because of the numerous stops we made. I finally got back to my house around 10:30PM. LONG DAY!
Pictures to follow; because you are required to pay per camera, we only paid for Sarah's -- so she has all the pictures at the moment.
The next day I somehow found the energy to be ready at 7:30 for Lawrence to pick me up. We retrieved a group that is here with ProGhana on an alternative winter break trip (11 students and 3 chaperones) and made our way to Kakum National Park, 45 minutes away, where we did the canopy walk and an educational forest walk. The canopy walk is a series of bridges made from wood and rope, suspended at the canopy level of the forest. The forest walk was guided by a park official who spoke about the uses of various trees. Pictures follow:
These signs are pretty common...
Tree urinal?
View of Kakum.
An elephant's skull; the tusks are fake (they had been taken by the time the skull was discovered).
The park entrance.
Some bamboo.
Twisty vines.
The canopy walkway from under.
More pictures of the walkway and platforms.
Views from the walkway.
Spider web with lots of prey.
This tree is a parasite tree; it grows on top of another and eventually takes over.
The wood of this tree is black ebony and was/is used for piano keys (it is now protected).
This tree is very soft when young, so it grows thorns at the approximate height of forest elephants to discourage them from leaning on it and breaking it. Evolution is amazing!
Termite mound (ew).
After Kakum, we went to a monkey sanctuary run by this vivacious Dutch lady and her husband. After the husband's trip to Ghana 6 or 7 years ago, he announced he was moving there to start an animal sanctuary and his wife agreed. They have not been back to Holland since!
Most of their animals are brought to them by hunters as babies. Normally, the hunters take the adults and leave the babies to die in the forest. The sanctuary proprietors pay them a bit of money to bring the babies to them instead. Currently, they have 11 monkeys, a bunch of crocodiles, a duiker, some small jungle cats, mongooses (mongeese?) and tortoises, all pictured below. They are also building a small cafe at the top of a hill with spectacular views in every direction. I think they would make a great reality show: www.monkeyforestresort.com.
Monkeys!
Cats!
Crocs!
Tortoises!
Bird nests!
Snake! I found out that Ghanaians are very afraid of/superstitious about snakes. My host mother wouldn't even look at this picture when I showed her!
Snail!
The small stools pictured here are made to catch dwarfs. Ghanaians believe that dwarfs live in the forest. They kidnap unsuspecting people and drag them into the forest, usually never to be seen again. If someone does make it back, they take with them all the knowledge of the dwarfs about nature and medicine, and they become powerful fetish priests. So, they are trying to attract the dwarfs with the small chairs, which will have glue spread on the seat to catch the creatures.
They really are Dutch -- wooden shoes!
The Dutch lady (in the middle).
After the monkey sanctuary, we went to Hans Cottage Botel which features a small lake, on which is built a restaurant and a gift shop. There is at least one live, adult crocodile living in the lake, of which I got a blurry picture:
We had lunch there and moved on to Cape Coast Castle. It was very similar to Elmina, but more features have been altered; I think I enjoyed Elmina far more. Anyway, here are some picture of the castle and views of the town and fishing boats:
Needless to say, it was a busy weekend. I am still exhausted since the power was out from 11PM to 8AM last night/this morning, and I could hardly sleep for sweating without the fan. In addition, the neighborhood dogs decided to join in a half-hour concert of howling and barking at 2:30AM this morning, and some drunks had a screaming match in the street outside my house immediately after. I can't deny I am looking forward to the quiet of my suburban apartment in Virginia...
I'll stop here, as this post is quite long enough. I'll try to write one more time before I leave for Accra on Friday!
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