Hey all,
We are saying farewell to Ghana. We had an amazing time here starting with the first day. We went out with out any concrete plans, to catch the shuttle into Accra and ran into many difficulties. The we waited for about an hour and the shuttle never came. We met up with our friends Alix and ZZ and decided to take a taxi instead. All the taxis were parked in a lot and as soon as we walked in about 30 men pulling us in all different directions, trying to get us to go into their cabs, bombarded us. We finally managed to get into one and asked to be dropped off in the main city center of Osu. The drive was about an hour and as we approached the city, we could tell the driver didn’t know where he was going. He proceeded to pull into a market. We decided to get out there because the driver was demanding more money and many people accosted us. Two men came up to the car and introduced themselves as Liman and Jaqual. They offered to show us around for the day. We saw a few costal vistas and went and had a delicious lunch in the market. Next they took us to their drum shop where they and their friends played for us. They then taught us how to play and we jammed with them for a while. It was super fun! Kiah has bruises on her fingers. They also showed us some good shopping spots in the market. After all of that, they took us to the “tro-tro” (public buses that looked like mini vans that they packed FULL.) station and we said our farewells and headed back to the ship. We were too exhausted to go out that night.
Day 2:
We had to wake up at 6:30am to go on a day trip to the cape coast where we saw castles and slave dungeons. It was a 3 hour ride there and traffic here is horrendous, probably worse than LA, Atlanta and Chicago put together. On they way there there was construction and our bus stopped. We saw our tour guide get out of the bus and talk to a policeman and the policeman then guided us through the traffic, forcing cars to move out of the way for us. We reached the first castle and it was a very humbling experience. We then had lunch at a very beautiful hotel on the ocean then saw another castle after. The drive back took about 5 hours and it took us about 20 minutes to go a block. We got back 2 ½ hours later than we were supposed to so we just decided to stay in again.
Day 3:
We tried to wake up early, but naturally failed. We got into action around 11. We took the shuttle into town and did so much needed shopping. We also had some dericious Chinese food for lunch. That night we went out with our friends ZZ, Alix, Liz and Rikki to town. We almost got stuck in the ship for an hour because they were moving gangplanks and were not going to let us off. There was a mob of about 30 angry students demanding to be let off for their last night in Ghana. We were thankfully released and went to a bar first where we were swarmed with friendly Ghanaians who informed us that there was live music down the road. We walked over to the outdoor music club that was filled with both Ghanaians and SAS kids. We danced night away and our friend Liman was there. We left at about 2 in the morning and got into two cabs, each with 3 people in them. We insisted that the cabs stick together for the drive back. When we arrived at the police check point on the expressway, both taxis were pulled over. We were told to get out of the car by a man dressed in fatigues and carrying a gun. He asked us why we weren’t wearing our seat belts and ushered us into his shack. There he tried to get us to go individually into the back rooms but we refused and stuck together. He then wanted u to pay him off, each person paying 10 cedi ($8) each. After that he let us go and told us to buckle up but the cabs don’t have seat belts. After that harrowing ride back to the port, we rode in a pick up truck back to she ship. An eventful evening to say the least! We loved Ghana and the people. It has been our favorite place so far. We hope to come back!