Phase 15: Ghana

English-speaking; hugely friendly and efficient; air con shopping malls; electricity 24/7; traffic signals that both work and are obeyed; a fully-stocked Shoprite (excellent grocery chain from SA) with overflowing aisles; a bookshop to rival Waterstones and the ability to shop with an ATM card at the POS: Ghana is truly a miracle after the previous 15,000 kms of barely-hanging-in-there Africa ...

That said, it also manages to not feel at all like Africa for all that shine – just a bit too polished, a bit too ‘normal’ and way, way too many white folk (does every young save-the-worlder choose Ghana?? The mall’s full of them looking dreadfully earnest and studiously ignoring our presence as we pass, lest it spoil their ‘unique experience’ ...). It is most definitely, as we’d heard it described previously both affectionately and dismissively, “Africa Lite” but for that it does make for a nice – and somewhat morale-boosting – break (like washing ashore on an island of plenty having bobbed about lost for weeks on an empty sea ....).

Stayed at Big Mommas or some such “must stay” outside of Accra on the beach, and while at first I am highly cynical while driving in as it seems to be populated by no one over the age of 20 - many of whom seem to be saving the country one local guy at a time - but I quickly retire my bad attitude and we enjoy a mellow night in our truck, with a fun ‘local style’ celebration going on late into the night at the bar for a group of 17 English early childhood education uni students enjoying a weekend break after attending a conference and before heading out for a few weeks volunteer practicum. Probably a nice weekend getaway spot, but we see little of the beach as the sun sets quickly after we arrive and we’re off early the next morning for Green Turtle Lodge, another ‘must stay’ for overlanders located some miles down the coast.

Firstly though we stop off at the slave museum located in the original purpose-built fort on the Cape Coast, which of all we’d visited previously was the most impressive, with a very informative tour through the dark and foreboding underground cells/holding tanks; and while having been extensively renovated over the years, still had a real feel of ‘as it was.’ 

And President Obama has laid a plaque there on a visit the year before, so it must be a good one ...

And it is, with a very serious, well-researched and delivered tour through the underground holding cells where hundreds packed spaces ‘designed’ (read: where there was only actual space) for dozens while awaiting their fate. And interestingly we were the only tourists in attendance, the rest of the sombre crowd locals from around the region, most with children in tow on what must have been more a pilgrimage than a holiday destination.

We wrap our relaxation break at Green Turtle Lodge, surrounded by NGO’s on breaks and students on foreign internships taking in the sun. I on the other hand have a severe allergic reaction to my malaria meds (Doxy) and suddenly, blazingly, blister up while sitting under a shady tree at 8 a.m. and suffer for a week – and look like some tropical rookie who’s sun-baked himself into a severe medical condition. Not good.

Break over, we’re ready to get back to reality ...