An adventurous weekend

I am sorry it has been so long since I have been able to post. The internet in Mampong is broken, so we had to wait to travel to the bigger town of Kumasi to find a cafe that works. Thank you all for your comments and emails ( and enormous packages of food...) they mean a whole lot to me down here.

This weekend, Froukje (the Dutch girl I live and work with) and I travelled to the Mole National Park. We left Thursday night intending to take a 6-hour busride to Tamale scheduled to arrive around midnight. The bus left 3 hours late then broke down 2 hours into the trip. We were confidently told that someone had called Kumasi and another bus would be there to pick us up and finish the journey shortly. 8 hours later, we were still sitting on a broken down bus. When the sun came up Friday morning, Froukje and I left the broken bus and grabbed a tro-tro to a nearby town, found a bus going in the right direction, and got to Tamale just in time to catch the bus to Mole (we were supposed to have almost a full day in Tamale first). On the way to Mole (a 4-6 hour drive) our headlights stopped working, so we stopped for about an hour to try to fix them, couldn't, so drove on without lights. On a very dark night, on a very winding and extremely poorly kept dirt road. What an adventure. 32 hours after leaving Mampong (17 waiting and 15 moving) we finally got to the park!

Mole is the most touristed spot in Ghana, and there were not many people there. The tourist industry is very new in Ghana, and they definitly have a long way to go, but there is alot of potential! We took a safari walk and saw lots of babboons, warthogs, guinea fowl, bushbucks, and even a few elephants. Other than that, however, there is not much to do at the only place to stay in the park.

Travelling home was a bit easier- we were lucky enough to meet a group of Americans studying in Accra that had chartered a bus to Mole, so we caught a free ride with them back to Kumasi! It was a good thing too, because after having to pay to get there twice, Froukje and I were VERY clost to running out of cash! It was a great weekend though. I am not home yet, so I don't have pictures to post of this, but I'm afraid the animal pictures won't compare much with the ones we took in Tanzania last summer.

Our adventure this weekend seems to be common travelling practice around here. I have learned that if you really need to be somewhere on a certain day, allow 2 to get there!

Many people have asked about the weather here. So far, it is extremey similar to August in Virignia. It gets very hot during the day, but always rains and the rain usually cools it off for a very pleasant evening and morning. We are in the rainy season right now, in a few months it will get hotter (yikes!) and very dry. The daily thunderstorms are incredible. The thunder rolls for minutes because there is nothing to block the sound! It's beautiful.