Surf's Up!

I spent all last week hiding in my room in front of my fan writing my report, which went relatively well considering it was extremely labour intensive. On Saturday my friend Julie came to Accra and we left for Cape Coast – a beautiful coastal town in the Western region. We arrived a few hours later and walked to our beachside hostel which had really loud reggae playing and a shocking amount of foreigners. The day went on, we swam in the ocean and ate shrimp at a seaside restaurant and headed back to our hostel for the evening. The problem with alcohol in Ghana is that it’s extraordinarily cheap, so there’s very little holding you back from having too much of it. Julie and I, even being the diligent students that we are, were not exempt to this temptation. The next day (Sunday) we woke up mangled, and I think a combination of not so good shrimp and too much cheap local liquor hit me and we left that quaint town with a bang: me puking over a railing in front of about 700 Ghanaians worshipping the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, while Julie hailed a taxi about as fast as she could so we could hightail out of there.

After some coconut juice I was feeling better and we hopped in a tro tro to Takoradi, and arrived there mid-afternoon where we had lunch at a uniquely Western restaurant and found a Barclay’s Bank before heading to Akwidaa on another tro. There was a frustrating lack of public transportation running because it was Easter Sunday, so we were stuck without a tro and had to get an expensive taxi to take us to our next destination – the Green Turtle. It was worth it in the end because Green Turtle was one of the most beautiful and well run places I have been in Ghana. It’s all powered on solar power, has self-composting toilets, food that is out of this world, a huge beach, and inexpensive accommodation. There we met up with our colleague Leah and spent a couple days reading on the beach and drinking ground coffee out of a French Press. We also were able to take a canoe tour through the mangroves which was fascinating and educative, however terrifying because the handmade craft was beyond tippy and I was on constant bailing duty for fear of sinking all together.

Green Turtle, in all its glory, is quite inaccessible. After walking for a while down the beach with our huge backpacks we realized we’d have to sit for hours waiting for the tro in this miniscule village with a crowd of children staring wide-eyed at us if we didn’t figure out another plan. I went back to Green Turtle and got us a cab, which after much cajoling took us to an even smaller village called Botre, which was about a half hour East of Green Turtle and was also on the beach. Near Botre was The Hideout, which was nice but I mentioned to Julie I felt that if I died no one would really notice, and that’s a level of seclusion that’s a bit too high for me. It was worth it for the amazing breakfast we got served, and the fact that there was electricity so we could charge our phones and use our laptops to do schoolwork.

After traipsing across the rickety bridge from hell where I was sure we would drown – all the planks were on mismatching 40 degree angles – we sat and waited for a tro to come to Botre. (You may notice sitting in villages and waiting for a tro is our number one activity.) We headed back to Agona junction, hopped in a shared cab, and headed to Busua where we finally found:

The Black Star’s Surf Shop!

(…which is what we’d been looking for the whole GD time.) We got a pleasant, clean room at a hostel, beetled over to the surf shop, and a polite young man from New Zealand and an equally respectful Ghanaian man agreed to give us some lessons. I was worried about the bottoms of my bikini blowing off in the waves so we all agreed that should that occur none would take offense. Luckily that never happened and I learned two surprising things: I love surfing, and I’m good at it! (Although we only used the boards that are equivalent to having training wheels.) I was pleasantly surprised as I had anticipated total failure. The surf shop people were so lovely, I had some excellent conversations about literature and development, and before we knew it, it was time to leave.

Longest Day of Traveling Ever (Friday April 9)
• 11 vehicles
• 12 hours
• 300 km (give or take)
• one broken down tro where the gas pedal blew straight off
• one delicious lunch on the coast of Elmina
• one acquired head cold

and we made it! Back to Tema in time to prepare for our presentations next week. This week will consist of seeing all my friends that I have been away from this semester, presenting my report of my placement, getting some take-home gifts, giving away a lot of clothes I have collected here, and packing my things for the anticipated return flight home. For a while I truly believed we would be here forever, I can’t explain why I felt that way, but I was so sure. I guess I’ll be proven wrong in a week or so.

I can’t wait to see everyone; I miss my family so much. I will miss Ghana, but not as much as I have missed Canada. See you all soon!