Ghana inland
Day 81 (25 December) – Christmas day: Tamale to Lake Bosumtwi
Christmas day means a Christmas breakfast and I know just the place! For breakfast we go back to the ladies at the roadside that make those delicious omelets. We order three omelets and two coffees and were served three omelets and three coffees… You can make a fuss about this but in the end we only paid C 3.90 (divide by half for Euros), which is not worth the trouble and the omelets are soo tasty!
After a great breakfast we hit the road, Tamale is not the place to spend Christmas. It is my second time I drive this stretch to Kumasi. Crossing the Black and White Volta, this time I had a camera on hand to snap some shots. But this time I remembered to drive around the market in Kumasi.
We didn’t stop in Kumasi, only for the traffic jams, and headed out South to Lake Bosumtwi. At the lake is a camping place that is supposedly owned by the same people as Aylo’s Bay and would be just as nice. The information was correct, only missing the swing!
We were immediately invited for a Christmas dinner with all the other guests and we ate the very tasty Fufu. Three beers and a movie later we closed our eyes at this lovely place.
Day 82 (26 December) – Boxing Day at Rainbow Village lodge
We stayed another day at the lake. After coffee and cheese on ‘God First Bakery’ sandwiches we were sweating… It was hot and we needed a cool down fast! We tried the lake but the water was just like tea (as TIA already warned us). Still it is nice to swim and float around in the water when it is this hot.
I checked my email and send updates to Stanley and Julia, hoping they could make it to us and we all could meet up. But I got the message from them they would go today to Boabeng-Fiema, a monkey sanctuary between Tamale and Kumasi that we skipped. Unfortunately tomorrow we want to go to Kakum and then to the beach…
Day 83 (27 December) – Driving the long way round to Kakum
I estimated it being a short 4 hour drive to Kakum National Park, but once again it ended up lasting almost the whole day. We took some wrong turns and therefore didn’t manage to drive the shortest way. We had to drive all the way to Cape Coast before making our way to Kakum. We planned to spend the night is a lovely place in the forest or even outside on a tree platform with possibilities to see the forest elaphants! Reading the travel guides it all sounded to good to be true… But we were arriving at the park at sunset and it was too late to go into the park. The campsite at the parkentrance (read parkinglot) was not nice at all and way to expensive. So we decided to drive back to Hans Cottage Botel which was also highly recommended where we spend the night with 3 beers each and a movie (‘The Other Guys’ is highly recommended to see!).
Day 84 (28 December) – From Kakum’s disappointment to a perfect beach
The long talked about canopy rope bridges above the rain forest of Kakum National Park: Exciting! The travel guide, published last June, mentioned an entrance fee of C10 (~ 5 euro) but they were informed of increases of the price by 30%. Arriving at the ticket office and looking at the price lists we were shocked… A 40 minute canopy walk costs nowadays C30 (15 euro)!!! Although we went for the walk it was not worth the money. It gives you a nice view over the forest but you are being sent over the bridges in large groups. Kakum is Ghana’s biggest tourist attraction, but I’m not sure how long it will attract so many tourists. It is just not worth it.
3 km before the entrance of Kakum Park is a Monkey Forest Reserve run by a Dutch couple. They have built from scratch a monkey sanctuary where they pick up and shelter abandoned baby moneys from the forest. They even house a few civet cats from the Kakum forest. It is a nice place and I was told that when you call at least two days in advance, they can prepare home made ‘bitterballen’!
While enjoying some groundnut soup (very much recommendable) at Hans Cottage Botel we got the tip to go to Ko-Sa beach resort, that would be just as nice as the much talked about Green Turtle Lodge but than just around the corner. I guess anything would be an improvement from the much disappointing and overpriced Kakum. Once at Ko-Sa it was indeed a great place to hang around. It is run by a Dutch couple and they fixed the place up nicely. There is not much place to camp but palm trees all around. The restaurant is a bit pricy but well worth it. Three beers later it was time to lie in the horizontal position.
