Happy New Year!
0Monday, 14 January 2013 by Renee
Why hello there 2013 - Happy New Year Everyone!
I must apologise for the the lack of posts of late - we're now back in Accra after some travelling through Ghana over the Christmas break. I promise to share some highlights of our trip over the next few weeks!
After visiting Akosombo and Wli in the East, we saw in the New Year at Cape Three Points, the most southern point of Ghana, over in Western region. We stayed at a great, relaxed place called Escape (EsCape Three Points, ba-boom!) along with fellow Aussie volunteers, one volunteer's family who flew in for a holiday, and whoever else we managed to coerce into our shenangians.
There was a lot of hammock time...
swimming time...
beach walk time...
and hiking time...
(Pre-Hike Team Photo - Obruni Why??)
On New Years Eve, a group of us decided to go for a guided hike through the Cape Three Points Forest Reserve, home to such exciting things as monkeys, birds and a crazy number of butterflies.
This was a great idea until we found ourselves with a guide who was not a guide, may have had a bit too much palm wine with his lunch, and had forgotten his cutlass. Hmmph. Luckily there were some redeeming features of the hike, including seeing how rubber is tapped from the trees as we walked through the massive rubber plantations...
finding a sea hawk's nest in an old boab tree...
And some just generally nice vews...
Needless to say, when we finally got home covered in mud and cuts from all the overgrowth we'd scrambled through, we were pretty darn exhausted. Luckily, to get the party started, the staff at Escape went all out and prepared a special New Years feast including a goats cheese entree, lobster and fish for mains chocolate/banana/coconut desert! I don't think I've yet covered food but let's just say the food here takes some getting used to, so it was a bit special to have some more familiar tastes!
After that we migrated to the bar on the beach for some bonfire, hitting the d-floor and general silliness.
The hikers amongst us were exhausted from our non-walk through the jungle, and some of us were battling colds, but we powered on to see in the new year complete with beach fire works.
I often think New Years is a peculiar celebration, but as things wound down and we settled in with our Akperteshie (distilled Palm Wine spirit) cocktails, it was nice to sit around a bonfire and reflect on the year on the year past and the year coming.
2012 was a BIIIIIIIIIIIIG year for Adam and I - a trip around China, hiking 100km in 32hrs with Team Uncootha, a Phd submitted, plenty of gigs, a new job, wrapping up my last job and a big move to Ghana! The prospect of facing 2013 in Africa is an exciting one indeed.
