February 1- February 16

Route Traveled

Ghana
    Kokrobite - Takoradi - Busua - Elmina - Kokrobite



    This part of my trip can be rounded up into one basic theme, hanging out on the beach and living easy. In Kokrobite everyday i would usually wake up and find some food on the beach most likely consisting of pineapple banannas and some bread and butter, or i would go to my friend Johnnys spot and get a great egg sandwich. At Big Milly's the place that i stayed i met a 20 year old guy named yasser from Holland, who had been volunteering in the volta region of ghana helping to build a school, and we hung out for the entire first 8 days i was staying there. We hung out with the rastas, mostly a laid back one named Isaaca who didnt have any money or really more than a hut to sleep in. Most days the three of us would go to the market and buy some food to cook up, usually some beans rice, tomatoes onions and some spices, for the same price it would cost to feed one person, we were able to feed about 7 or 8. when the food was done we would get our plates and then give the rest to the children who were hanging around, and to some other rastas around on the beach. Kokrobite was a really great place to kick back and do nothing. they had a book exchange in the reception and i found some good books to read and become a porch monkey in front of my room. I started to get to know pretty much everyone around the hotel, all the staff and everyone out on the beach and on the way to the village. Everytime i would walk around i would say hello to so many people and vice versa, and it was a really welcoming and homely feeling around there.    Swimming in the ocean many times a day was also part of the daily life. That first wednesday that i was there, Isaaca Yasser and some other people decided to go into Accra for regaee night on Labadi beach. I bought a bottle of a liquor called Ginseng made of course from Ginseng root for under 2 dollars. we all jumped in a tro tro which is a mini bus that crams about 20 people at a time in it and drives around cities and long distances, but it only costs about 60 cents or so to go to Accra on it. After making it to the beach after finding some food in town we tried to sneak in the back way on the beach and not pay, but we got caught and paid but we managed to get issaaca in for free so it was still worth it. the night was a lot of fun full of dancing around and drinking, i also bought a couple water bottles of palm wine and we all shared that, Emanuel also met us there as well did bobo from kokrobite. Emanuel was the guy that wanted to make me the king of his village back in my last story. so after a long night of partying and good music we got a taxi back to kokrobite at around 230am and called it a night. oh yeh i forgot that this night i met Mario who is a 21 year old mexican but living in san diego and is travelling around west africa as well. we all got along really well and the next day hung out and did basically the same things. On friday getting ready to plan my trip east i took an adventure back into Accra, which of course is the capital. but driving in this city is horrible, going anywhere even a few miles can take an hour do to the insanely bad traffic. the pollution is also quite bad, so i didnt really like spending to much time around there. anyway a caught a tro tro into the city in the morning and my goal was to make it to the Nigerian embassy so i can get a visa to travel there. I found a taxi, and it was a really nice man who was very welcoming and he even offered is daughter for marriage, i politely declined, this isnt the first time ive been offered someones daughter or sister or even just a friend of someone, it happens it seems once a day. all the africans want to give away a girl to me, and i just tell them that i think the girl should also be able to choose who they want to be with, and they disagree, but i just laugh them off, and continue on. anyway this taxi driver has no clue how to get to the embassy and he stops many times to ask, and after about an hour we wind up at a building where the old embassy used to be. so we drive on asking and asking until we get to a place where i run into a crazy lebanese guy named prince who i had met at big milly's the last reggae night. we just happened to stop right in front of his wholesale store, but when the cabby jumped out to ask for directions, he had parked his car on the sidewalk. he was barely in the shop for 45 seconds when he came out to his tire getting a clamp on it. he ran histerically to the parking police and starting pleading to take it off. these guys came out of nowhere somehow and already had the clamp on the tire, we were trying so hard to get them to let him off for free, but nothing was working. Prince even gave one of the police a bag of rice, but it did no good. even the people around the shop were happy that the taxi driver was getting in trouble, i couldnt understand it. so in order to argue his case, i jumped back into the cab along with two of the parking police guys who were really young and we drove off. i didnt really know where we were going, but i was hoping they would take me to the embassy first and then handle their troubles. but we drove another 30 minutes and arrived at this huge gate that said above it Waste Management Department. It was a huge compound with a bunch of towed and repoed cars in it. and it was the main office of the parking police. so in we went, and after about 20 minutes of pleading the taxi driver came to me and asked him to help him pay the fee, he asked me for 20 cedis, which is 14 dollars. i felt badly enough that he was in trouble, but it still wasnt my responsibility to pay for it, so for his trouble i gave him 10 cedis and of course he had been driving me around for a long time now. he told me he called his wife to come bring the money for him. he still really wanted to get me to the embassy but i had enough and said i was leaving to find another ride, he was nice enough after getting more directions to explain the next taxi driver how to get to the embassy. after going back to the other side of town, we finally made it to the nigerian embassy. when i walked in they told me that they didnt accept application forms that day and to come back on monday.  i got the information i needed to apply for the visa and i was off back to the tro tro to kokrobite. an adventure that took most of the day that got me pretty much nowhere and i was drained. I made it back to big millys in time for the music which on fridays they play traditional ghana music with drums and dancing and other sorts. a really good show indeed. the next day was saturday and reggae night once again at big milly's. hung out all day and cooked a ton of food, then i went with yasser and mario to the store. i bought a liter of lions rum and a bottle of ginseng to share with whomever wanted to join in. also bought a liter of coca cola. that night we had a blast dancing all night and hearing a band called a hope for africa. earlier that day we met a guy who talked and talked but all in a positive way whos name was yagga yo. he said that yagga yo is life and consists of everything around us, and he said when people are happy they say yagga yo, and even when they are sad they say yagga yo but in a more depressing tone. later at reggae night yagga yo went up on stage and put on a hell of a show along with the hope for africa band, his energy was electric and he got every jamming. the next day was sunday and Yasser and Mario and i decided to leave kokrobite and take a trip down the coast towards the west. i stored my big bag at the hotel, and just took one t shirt and two shorts and a few other things like my camera and music. we got a tro tro to accra and then found amazingly an air conditioned tro tro that would take us down the coast about 4 hours to a city called Takoradi. this was the nicest public ride ive had so far in africa, i got to sit up front and get the full advantage of the ac. put on my music and coasted off. we arrived in takoradi around 5pm, and decided instead of going to our destination of busua, we would stay the night there. also mario needed to use the atm the next day. we found a hotel called hotel zenith in the middle of this bustling town, with not much to look at. we all shared a room, but the funny thing was it seemed every other room i passed by there was about 3 or 4 girls in it and when i passed they were all ask if i wanted to have sex with them. realized quickly after going down stairs and getting the proposal again, that we were staying in a whorehouse. it probably wasnt officially one, but it basically was, all night there was booming music coming through our room and other sorts of happenings in the hotel. after a tough and hot and humid sleep we managed to find another tro tro to take us back to the beach, this one being busua. when we arrived we found a cheap hostal but it was off the beach. dumped our stuff and headed straight to the surf shop,cuz mario was a really good surfer and he couldnt wait to get out on the waves. we rented a board to share between the 3 of us for the day. when it was my turn i had an interesting but fun time out there trying to stand up and surf. i caught a few waves which werent very big and i managed to stand up for a few seconds before tumbling into the sea. after about 2 hours i had my fill and passed the board on. the beach in busua was even nicer than kokrobite and somehow even more laid back. we met some more rastas that night and did the usual. the next day after a sub par night in the hot hotel we decided that we should move to another hotel. at the end of the beach tucked away behing some 500 year old cotton trees we found a mini paradise. the rasta that owned it was called Black Eagle, he was a very friendly guy. there was only one room in the whole hotel, because black eagle wanted to keep it private and quiet for his guests, and it was. the three of us split the chalet, and i again grabbed my mattress on the floor while yasser and mario shared the big bed as we had done on the other two nights. this place was perfect, amazing trees that gave off a powerful mystic vibe, and about 20 feet from our room was the ocean, couldnt have asked for anything nicer. Black eagle cooked us some good food for lunch, and the whole day just swam, boogie boarded and relaxed.  
    that day earlier when i was sitting in the hammock at the surf shop and saw a guy who i had met in timbuktu at the festival au desert. i really couldnt believe i saw him again here, his name is Miles and he is a 32 year old from Alaska. He rode his back from Madrid Spain to here in Ghana, and his planning to ride all the way to south africa. I told him about the guy i met Yoni in Burkina Faso, and he told me that he also heard about this guy as he was riding but was never able to catch up to him. I told him that i had Yoni's email and that we should write him to see if the two of them could meet up and possibly ride all the way to south africa together. the funny thing was that i had told yoni about this Miles when i was in burkina with him and he also thought it would be great to meet up. more from this story later...
    the next day was a wednesday and we did nothing but kick back all day, later in the night we me up with two dutch girls that we had formerly met back at big millys. also a young guy named tim from germany joined us at the black eagle for drinks and smokes. it was yasser's last night for he was flying back to Holland in a couple days. we celebrated his 5 month stay in ghana and reflected a lot on his experience. he told me that he learned some things from me, and i asked him what, and he told me that he learned to just take things as they come. the six of us along with black eagle enjoyed a great dinner and night. i had mentioned to one of the dutch girls named kim that was teaching at a school in accra that i wanted to take a long walk the next day 11km to a place on the beach called akwaada. she decided that she wanted to come along, we agreed to meet the next day at 9am, to all have breakfast and say goodbye to yasser. after a nice breaky made from black eagle and his assistant, we said our goodbyes and kim and i were off on our walk. the walk was really beautiful, we passed by small villages full of happy kids calling after us, calling us obruni's which is the ghana word for white man or woman. the landscape was lush and green with hills of palms trees and the ocean just a few mintues to the side of us. about 2 hours in we were able to cut out onto the ocean and walk the rest of the way on the sand. this place was miles and miles of empty coastline that hadnt yet been developed. a perfect stretch of beach. our goal was to get to a guesthouse called the green turtle lodge. after about 3 hours of walking we had made it. ordered a massive lunch that was delicious and hung out on the beach swimming and napping for a couple hours. then we walked back another 11km our home at black eagles. we arrived just after dark, and kim was exhausted. i was doing pretty good after the six hour walk, she was so tired that she had her friend henrietta go get some food for us along with mario. we ate self made guacamole sandwiches. later that night when kim was ready to go home i lent he my headlamp to get back to her hotel. she agreed to bring it back in the morning. the next day i was to leave head back east towards kokrobite. Mario stayed and was planning on heading up to burkina faso in a couple weeks, pretty much the exact route that i had already taken into morocco. i went to find kim after she didnt show with the light, i went to her room but she wasnt there, mario had found them and told me that she had left the lamp at my hotel earlier that morning. i went back and it was no where to be found, we looked all over but never did find it. so i headed off said my goodbyes and found a bus to take me from busua to the junction to pick up a tro tro. i decided to cut up the trip and stop in a fishing town called elmina. a very important stop on the slave trade route. i found a tro tro back to takoradi where i then found another one to drop me at Elmina. I met a ghanaian guy on the tro tro and i asked him how to walk into town. he ended up walking with me the 20 mintues into the center, and we talked the whole way about ghana and the usa. this town had the oldest fort and castle from the european days and it was jammed full of fishermen. when i got to the center of the city and saw the river that lead to the ocean it was like a rainbow of colors on the fishing boats. there were so many of them it was quite a site. i kept walking until i found a guesthouse tucked behind a village in a remote area of town. got myself a room for the night, ventured out later, and on this road the people paid a lot of attention to me especially the kids, always yelling at me asking my name and the usual obruni calls. find a nice air conditioned hotel to eat some dinner and had a salad with spring rolls, in front of the castle. enjoyed the ac some more and read a magazine for awhile, and then headed back. in ghana ive been eating two things on the street that ive really liked, plaintain chips and peanuts. they are everywhere and cheap and a really good food for munchies. anyway i went back to my guesthouse and had a quite night reading. the next day which was saturday i wanted to make it back to kokrobite for another reggae night. walked about an hour to the tro tro junction, and caught one to accra. i told the conductor to drop me off at the kokrobite junction road so i could walk the 5 miles or so instead of getting stuck in the accra traffic for another hour, but he forgot so i had to go all the way back into accra. the good thing about it was that i found some really good headphones cuz mine broke and i was able to go to the atm. so i got another tro tro back to kokrobite, when i arrived i went to the store and bought another bottle of rum to share with my friends for reggae night. the first person i saw was Miles the biker from alaska, i had told him we should meet up at kokrobite , and there he was, we also planned to meet yoni there the next day. i asked miles if he wanted to help me drink the bottle of rum and he said of course. when i walked into big milly's i was greeted all over the place by the people i had come to know the 8 days i was already staying there. it kind of felt like coming back home. they didnt have any rooms left as i expected, because so many volunteers from accra come to big millys for the weekend to hear the music. i was however able to get a room in the dorm loft. i showered up and met up with miles and issaaca and emanuel and we drank some rum and cokes. i think i danced for about 5 hours straight after that, with some friendly ghanaian girls. after the music was over i experienced my first storm of africa. it rained a lot and was really windy, i retreated to the open air loft where i got one of the best sleeps since being on the coast of ghana. the humidity lifted and the wind was like air conditioning and it felt great. although i think a lot of the beds got really wet, for some reason mine stayed dry. the next day feeling a little hungover, i wanted to get my own room for the rest of my stay at big milly's. the only problem was the lockbox that i used to keep my things secure, i couldnt open. i always leave my key at the bar when im not in my room, but this time with the loft key, it was so tiny and without a keychain. they could not find the key to open the box. they had to wait till 4pm to see if the nightime staff knew where it was. so i only had a few bits of money left until then, but i made it last, went with isaaca to get a egg sandwich at johnny's shop, then got my room which was the same one as last time, as i wanted. while i was taking a nap i heard a german accent and i knew it was Yoni the biker from germany who i had met in burkina... coming into my room, which the door was already open. we had a very niec greeting and i was happy to see him again down here in ghana. he had already been here for about 10 days visiting the father of his half brother. so we finally had the two bikers together miles and yoni. they talked all day and night about there bikes and their trips so far, and their plans for heading to south africa. we all hung out all day ate lunch and dinner together and i also caught up with yoni on his travels through ghana since i last saw him in burkina faso. Miles and Yoni decided to continue the journey together and team up, going the same direction i am from ghana to togo to benin and into nigeria. Miles was really worried to bike through nigeria alone, so this would work out great for both of them. they both thanked me for linking them together, and i was pleased to do so. i hope that they get along well and make it to south africa together where i can meet them as well. the next day on monday was presidents day and i woke up with a brick in my stomach, i want get into detail but i had some serious runs all morning, back and forth to the toilet. i stayed close to my room most of the beginning of the day until i felt a little better, then ventured off to go swimming and hang out with miles yoni and isaaca. later yoni went back to accra and miles issaaca and i went to the store and bought supplies to cook a feast. we bought beans cabbage tomatoes onions garlic okra hot peppers maggi cubes, and issaaca cooked a great meal for us. my stomach a little better by then cuz i was drinking water after water to get my fluids back to normal. that night started reading a book a picked up the old classic Robinson Curuso. The next morning i woke with another brick in my stomach, which is today, the day i am writing this story. spent the good part of the 7am-9am portion of my morning in the toilet. my missions today were to get to the nigerian embassy and apply for my visa, buy a new headlamp at the accra mall since i had lost my last one, buy some deoderant, and upload my pics to my flickr account. so i got a tro tro to accra that arrived at 10am, and i exchanged cedis for dollars so i could buy my visa, found a taxi that said he knew where the embassy was, this time i new the part of the city where it was located, he stil had to ask directions when we got close. i got to the embassy with all my paperwork ready, and the guy whos name was PJ said i needed more. he said i needed a reservation from a hotel in nigeria, proof of insurance and an itinerary for my stay and a photocopy of my yellow book vaccinations. i told him this things i dont have and would be difficult to get. he said i must get them. he was quite friendly however and i was able to joke with him. so i set off in a mission to find these things. i made it to the internet shop and found an expensive hotel's website. i got the idea to get to the reservation page and fill it out, but when i got to the part where they asked for my credit card i left it blank, then i printed the page as it was without submitting the reservation request. then i typed up a made up itinerary for my dates of arrival and departure in nigeria, he also wanted my mode of travel which i wrote down bus , and i also wrote that i was planning on riding a bus onward to cameroon but this is not the truth. then i made a photocopy of my yellow book. within an hour i was back at the embassy, where Pj accepted my documents and told me to come back tomorrow at 230pm to hopefully pick up my visa. i asked him if everything was in order and he said there is a good chance i will receive the visa. i thanked him and was off. i took a taxi to the accra mall where i am now. its really nice just like a mall in america with ac and a food court and really fancy stores. i was able to find a new headlamp at the walmart type store and some deoderant and aaa rechargeable batteries which i had lost with the last headlamp. i then went to the foodcourt and indulged in a calzone which was so good at the pizza shop. i couldnt resist, i havent eaten food like that in a long time and lucky for me it was two for tuesday so i got to have two for the price of one, but the bad thing is my stomach was still rumbling. as for my last mission of the day uploading the pics, i found a fairly fast internet shop but i have about 350 pics to upload and its a slow go. im gonna need a few internet sessions to get them all up.  
    so my plan for the upcoming days are to hopefully get my visa to nigeria and then the next day grab a bus to togo, probably spend a couple days there and head right into benin. these countries are so thin that i can cross both of them in mere hours. im not sure how long i will stay in benin but i think maybe just two days as well, cuz i heard they only give you a two day transit visa at the border, and i dont really want to go through the trouble of getting it extended at the capital. so if all goes well i should be in Lagos within the next week. from there i am at a crossroad. i really wanted to travel overland back up to egypt. but seeing that its nearly impossible to get into libya being an american without spending tons of money, and the only other route into egypt is through darfur sudan, and that is out of the question. so i was thinking of buying a flight from lagos to cairo egypt, and then heading down the east coast of africa to south africa. i found some flights online so it doesnt look like it should be to difficult to make it up there. well thats the plan but who knows, this is africa things can change rather quickly.