Cape Coast!

I just got back from Cape Coast with my group. We left early Saturday morning (not as early as we were supposed to, though, the bus driver was on Ghana time) for Kakum National Park. We stopped in some village on the way because our bus needed some kind of tire repair or something. When we stopped all these little boys started showing off for us, doing flips and cartwheels and dancing. It was really cute and bizarre. When the bus driver told us we had to get off of the bus while it got fixed I thought “Oh my god, this is going to be crazy!”

And it kind of was. Some kids and my group played football/soccer with the kids. I ended up talking to this little boy who was babysitting his little brother and then I got to hold the little one! He was really sweet but he kept grabbing at my glasses. He was in love with me. I took a lot of pictures. It was really cute because as soon as you asked if you could take their picture like five other kids would come over and get in the picture too, and just when you had stepped back enough to fit everyone in, more kids would come. And then once you took it everyone would want to see and they would point at each other in the picture and laugh. It was really fun. Best pit stop ever.

 We got to the park around midmorning. Kakum National Park protects 357 square kilometers of some of Ghana’s only remaining forest. Part of it is real, legitimate rainforest, like from science classes and stuff and part of it is semideciduous. I don’t really know which is which, but all of it was beautiful. Even though the park is huge, only a small portion of it is accessible. The main attraction, and the only thing we did was the canopy walk. There were these swinging rope bridges strung between some of the really big tall trees. You could see over the whole rest of the forest from these bridges. It was really incredible. I took a lot of pictures. None of them are really that great because I took them with one hand while the other hand gripped the rope, but hopefully I will get some pictures up soon. Until then you can do an image search for Kakum if you want. It was totally awesome, but we had to wait in line for a really long time and it seems like lines are not quite an international concept like you might assume. The people we waited with were really loud and boisterous and also quite pushy. One step onto the rope bridge was enough to push the long wait out of our minds though. It was pretty exhilarating.

After a long wait for our lunch we headed to our lodging for the night. We stayed at a place called Anomabu Beach Resort. It was so beautiful! Each “room” is actually a clay hut, complete with a private bathroom, hot water heater, toilet paper, soap…The huts are surrounded by low coconut trees (marked with signs that say “Please do not pluck the coconut”). I’m fairly certain that the beach was the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. It was definitely the cleanest one I’ve been to in Ghana. It was very beautiful and romantic and made me feel pretty lovesick… It was such a magical place. The ocean was really fun to swim in, and the complimentary breakfast was also really good. All you can eat isn’t really a normal Ghanaian thing, usually you pay for exactly what you get (at some places you order rice by the price as if it were a measurement—30 peshwas of rice or 40) so it was really nice to just keep going back for more fresh pineapple.

I was sad to leave the resort (I don’t think I’ve ever stayed anywhere that called itself a resort before…hmmm). Next we went to St. George’s Castle, a castle originally built by the Portugese, but taken over by the Dutch, and then sold to the British. Though initially a trade and commerce center, the dungeons were soon used to house the most profitable trade items of the time—slaves. After capture, slaves were housed in castles/forts like this one near the harbor until a ship came for them. They were kept in the closest and filthiest of quarters and fed the absolute bare minimum, apparently to ensure that the strongest would survive and because the cost of obtaining slaves was so marginal. The tour guide was very knowledgeable and sensitive and really made it a powerful experience for everyone.

We tried to go to another slave castle, Cape Coast Castle, but the Anglican Church was holding a huge event there and we couldn’t get near it, so we just went to lunch and drove home.

The whole trip was organized by the directors of the program I’m on, ISEP, and we didn’t have to do anything except show up!

If anyone is still reading…look for a “Ghana in the News” post (I’ve been saving up some links) and a “Some Things You Take For Granted That I Don’t Anymore” post (still thinking of a good title for that one. And also, next weekend I’m going on another ISEP trip (this one I had to pay extra for though…) to the Northern region.