Mountains,Waterfalls & Lakes – The wanderlust got me even in Ghana
As I have experienced it before, especially in New Zealand, once
you think you have seen the most inspiring, peaceful, amazing place, you go around the corner and think This is it!
I felt similarly on our way to and through the Volta Region - one week after Kumasi and Bosumtwi. As soon as we'd crossed the Volta River near Atimpoku in a car and taken a quick glance at the glistening water, and as soon as the peaks of the Togo mountain range appeared, a slight feeling of home crept in. Mountains and water always give me this feeling, be it that they remind me of Bavaria or the fact that my parents used to 'drag' me accross every mountain they could find when I was little (for which I am very grateful now:).
Gladly, the four of us, Julia, Lilith and Jojo, were so full of wanderlust that after our first night in Hohoe, we didn't hesitate once at walking, or rather hiking, to the Upper Wli Falls, close to the Togolese border. Our Ghanaian guide Anthony was wearing pink flipflops, hello, it couldn't be that hard!
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| Anthony, our guide, and me (looking huge) |
Never underestimate a guide half your size, wearing 0,50€-flipflops but even more so, never underestimate the beauty of this country that will be your reward.
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| Wli Falls |
After almost two sweaty hours of hiking up a steep path through the thick forest (somewhere referred to as a semi-traitorous walk), gorgeous views onto the Volta Region and Wli waterfall, we had finally reached the upper Wli falls.
If we'd thought, we had also reached the highest level of wetness without actually jumping into the water, we were wrong, we reached it after standing in the cool spray of the waterfalls for 2 mins. We rested a bit, dried a bit and fed our starving guide with some of our cookies and water (he had finished his own earlier on) and walked or slided back down the mountain. Our search for a rewarding meal at night ended up in the dark due to a major blackout. We saw nothing in the streets, so to avoid falling into the open gutter, we went for another maccaroni cheese at our Grand Hotel.
The following day we made our way up to the promising Mountainparadise Lodge, near Mt Gemi, 2nd highest mountain in Ghana. It started with an interesting trotro-ride: The car was packed with obronis, who, not knowing how they could get to where they thought they were going, had just followed the four of us. Please, if I ever have to sit in a car with such naive German volunteers again, I will either get a Schreikrampf or I'll have to get off immediately. I have no idea how people with so little clue of anything and lack ofindependence get sent to Ghana to volunteer. Rather more exciting was the fact that our driver had no license and looked underaged (plus he was driving around 11 Oburonis) so the car was bound to be halted at the next police barrier. The police man seemed really fussy, too. However, just as the driver had gotten out of the car and followed the police man, he came back and drove on. The price: Probably 1 Ghana Cedi (0,50€). I call it pseudo-corruption...
The 4 ½ km walk from Fume up to Mountainparadise Lodge was a little harder than expected. We should have known that a mountainparadise cannot be accessed on a straight road...Luckily some guys on their motorbikes came past halfway, so in all our exhaustion we once again we forgot this thing called 'safety' and got on somebody's bike with our backpacks, shorts and no helmets...
As my Spanish teacher put it: This is Ghana, you have to improvise!
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| on my way to the bar ;) |
The Lodge didn't have its name for no reason (another paradise :)), they served coffee, the best groundnutsoup (NamE: peanutnut) in Ghana so far; we had the nicest mountain-panorama from the bar where we hung out eating snickers and drinking Club beer after our hikes, and, nice for a change, we could wear a jumper and socks in the evening without sweating the least bit (Which shouldn't mean that I'm complaining about the heat, though...).
Jojo's and my disappoinment at the crappy mountainbikes, which did not have brakes or gears and were therefore unsuitable for going up Mt Gemi, was soon gone after we'd decided to follow the girls hiking up Mt Gemi (840m) via Amedzofe, a former German mission. From the -also German- Gipfelkreuz or cross, we could see as far as Lake Volta.
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| Amedzofe in the background, Mt. Gemi ahead of us |
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| Biakpa village on the left, Mountainparadise on the right |
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| Lake Volta as seen from the dam |
On the fourth day, on our way back from the Volta Region to Accra, we had to get on and off an amazing 7 different vehicles to get back to Accra (in between lay a short sightseeing tour on the huge Akosombo dam in between the lake and river Volta). After our past trips, this one was probably the nicest and most pleasant one, not at last because of the local people, the Ewe, who greeted us with a friendly „You're welcome“ everywhere we went. It has also been the only place so far, where I could walk along the mainstreet by myself without dealing with a marriage proposal, friend request or missionaries - sometimes it's nice to be out of the focus of attention. Once again, I said to myself, I'll be back.
After my sister Paula arrived one day late –delayed by a storm in
Europe– and her luggage two days later – commonly happens on the way to Ghana– the first thing I did was take her on a four and a half day trip to the
Northern Region, thas is, 660km far Tamale and then Mole National Park. My sister
is surely one of the coolest travel buddies, she learnt how to buy food from
the bus window straight away and tried everything from bofrot (I’d call them
Ghanaian donuts) to giant pawpaws and even my beloved kenkey! 
