Archive for January 2013
Birthday Time!
0Friday, 25 January 2013 by Renee
Guess who's 30 today?
This guy!
I love him lots and I'm so happy he's with me here in this crazy new place!
Canoe Safari
3Wednesday, 23 January 2013 by Renee
Oh! We did have one adventure on our "do nothing" holiday. One morning we got up early (before dawn!) and headed down to Akwidaa town for a canoe safari through the mangroves behind the ocean.
Even through bleery eyes, the early morning rise was worth it to
witness the mangroves and its inhabitants at the most peaceful time of
day.
Although I was permanently afraid
that I was about to topple out of the precariously-balanced dugout canoe at any moment, it would have
to be one of the most serene moments in my memory – gliding though completely
silent waters and watching the crabs and birds go about their morning rituals,
with our guide telling us the animals’ stories in his calm deep voice.
One more night (or four)...
0by Renee
Following our New Year’s celebrations, our crew disbanded to
our various homes except for Adam and I
– we had decided to have a little bit of a retreat a few beaches down*, before
heading back to the big smoke. As much
as we love camping, it was a great treat to have four nights in our own mud and
straw hut, complete with outdoor shower, right on the beach.
Our days were filled with lying on the beach, drinking occasional coconuts when the local kids with their cutlasses came past, swimming when we felt brave enough/hot enough to hit the turbulent waters, and lying back
down to read until the next meal was ready – BLISS! We realised we hadn't had a "doing nothing holiday" for three years...
After a huge year, it was great to just kick back and watch the sunlight change from a silvery dance over the ocean in the morning to bathing everything in a warm glow in the late afternoon as the sun reached the horizon.
Or the Harmattan haze as we found out... It's currently Harmattan season, where the winds change to come from the north, at which time Ghana and it's neighbours tend to get covered in half of the Sahara Desert. As we found out, this means that the sun disappears behind the dust rather than the horizon, and makes for unique sunset viewing...
And the food! Oh Cape
Three Points had great food, but this was something else, and all served up
in a under a huge grass hut to a soundtrack of azonto (Ghana's new dance craze), regularly interspersed with a
Phil Collins live album, which of course is what every Obruni expects from their West African holiday.
*As an indication of how much more difficult simple things can be here, although it was only about 10km away, the move from Cape Three Points to Safari Beach took us an ENTIRE day! Payments are always cash here, but atms are not that easy to find outside of Accra, and frequently break down or run out of money. The atms on our journey to Cape Three Points were broken, so we still needed cash to pay our first lodging, and then get enough for the next. We were going to meet and pay the owner in Agona, the nearest town, but alas, the atm was broken again. So, we had to get a shared taxi to Takoradi, the next major city on the way back to Accra, find an atm there, and then head back and hopefully find the owner again before heading off to our new accommodation. (Even this wasn't straightforward; our shared taxi had a teenage Ghanaian girl in it who seemed to be distressed by the driver, pleading with him about something in their own language. When I asked if she was ok, things started to get weird, and Adam and I concluded it was either all a joke or some sort of scam, but it was nonetheless a weird experience!). Then once we were on our way back, we found out the accommodation owner had left Agona to attend an emergency, and thus directed us to hunt down a shopkeeker he trusted and to leave our hefty wad of cedi there. Finally, exhausted, we headed to the trotro station, only to find there was a long wait. Luckily, we found a lovely couple Alex and Aisha from the UK who were heading to the same lodge, and ended up sharing a cab with them. Just as the sun was going down, we reached our destination, less than 10km from where we had started! It was a good thing we had four days to relax...
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.
