So after three days of riding and lectures (generally follow safety guidelines or you will end up dead. When questioned about why local Ghanaians did not wear helmets, indicate, follow stop signs, have more than one passenger (not necessarily human!) etc a range of explanations were given, ranging from; they don't want to ruin their hair to those people will all die) it was time to go and get our driving licences! After horror stories from the last group about power cuts and day long waits we were prepared to for the worst. We set off early and to our surprise we were first in line when we arrived. None of us had enough passport photos and so we were taken outside for what turned out to be a rather bizarre photo shoot. One at a time we stood in front of a red background being blasted by strong gusts of wind being told how to hold our head and move just a fraction to the left before being snapped by a Polaroid camera. I thought I looked like a bit like a homeless reprobate but the others were more generous and said I looked like a bit of a rock star (I guess there is not a huge difference between the two!) I have uploaded a photo of the photo for you to make your own decisions.

After an eye test, a short one on one meeting and Buba fighting crowds of irate Ghanaians to get stuff processed we were ushered into the 'processing' room. Our 12 page form and 4 passport photos (the point of the last 3 hours) were promptly discarded onto the floor and I ended up typing my own details into the system for them as they had decided my name was Newton and I was a middle-aged Ghanaian woman. Would have been rather difficult to explain that if I had been pulled over by the police! After forking out 5 Cedis for a cool case and having another photo taken I was the proud owner of a tempory driving licence! As long as I don't kill anyone one/thing in the next three months I can upgrade to a full one. And all this only took 3 and a half hours! A new VSO record and so off we headed for an early victory lunch.

One of the great things about going on courses/workshops is your normally get fed much nicer food then you would make yourself at home. All Ghanaian menus have an incredibly lavish food selection. They always have a standard Ghanaian fare (rice, meat, carbs of some mushed type, soup), pasta with a Ghanaian twist, occasionally pizza, Chinese, Indian etc. What happens when you come to order is always the same. So can I have the spaghetti carbonara? No, don't have the ingredients, spring rolls, no, pizza? Needed to order that a day in advance. And this goes on and on until you have gone through most of the menu and you finally say, so what do you have? Chicken and Rice, banku and groundnut soup is the standard reply, meaning you end up paying 5 times what you would for normal street food which does not taste quite as good.

Fortunately, Swap always has pizza in stock! Cheese is so rare that you happily pay double English prices for it up here meaning for twice the price of a meal you end up getting the equivalent of a very small pizza, normally to share between 3 of you, but oh my god it's worth it! (Anyone who wants to chuck a few baby-bells, or some equivalent into a letter they send me I would be eternally grateful!).

The next day was our big trip! What the whole week had been gearing up to! Our big, day-long drive. It would encompass all terrains; from off-road to the equivalent of a Ghanaian motorway and start and finish with a bit of town riding. Sandwiched in would be a stop at a variety of different local tourist attractions.

The first stop was a lovely fare-trade hotel/workshop where we were very surprised to find that everything was being sold for very reasonable prices and I picked up my first bit of material to make a shirt for under £2. Our next stop was Paga, the home of the sacred crocodile pool! There was some long myth about why the crocodile pool was special but being Ghana there was no tourist office just a group of 5 Ghanaians sitting under this open-plan hut thing. After a bit of haggling we set off to sit on a croc. Health and safety officers, animal rights activists (and our mothers!) would probably have gone into full cardiac arrest if they saw what happened next. A few guys with sticks and two baby chickens wondered over to the edge of the water. The squawking of the baby chickens brought the crocs. The ones who were a bit feisty got a bop on the nose and we were asked one by one to sit on the back. I went first and caused a little bit of a ruckus as I pressed down too hard on the crocs back which apparently means 'go' in croc language and he started to wander off and we had just been informed they can reach speeds of up to 30mph in a straight line, so if you are ever chased by one on dry land run in circles. If you are chased by one in water you're screwed. If you look at the two pics of me on the croc you can see the difference. The first, everything is fine and I am smiling, the second he is just starting to move and you can see the panic all over my face!

Every now and again a croc would make a sneak attack out of the water and everyone would get very worked up and scatter until someone biffed him on the nose with the stick. Was all quite good fun until the baby chicks were fed to the crocs. They disappeared fast but it was a few minutes before the chirping stopped and they visibly moved down into the crocs stomachs!

Next it was off to the boarder where we, with permission from the boarder guards, went and stood in Bakino Faso. Then we Easy Ridered it back down the major tarred road in convoy at a mind numbing 70 km/h. Rather nerve-wracking as you are passed by a massive honking metro-mass bus. Despite a few close calls we all made it back in one piece and bike training was over!

The next day we had our first VSO party! Some of the houses in Bolga are epic! One had a full on balcony where you can sit about 12 and apparently is brilliant to spend a night on when the weather is hot as it has a lovely breeze. It was also a chance to meet up with a load of different volunteers I had not met yet and lots of locals. It was also the first time to have my first proper boogie since my leaving party but I do need to practice my Azunto as my moves are a little stuttery! It did not help that when we got back to Bernard's four of us drank a carton of red wine leading to me feeling a little fragile the next morning!

Although not feeling strong the next morning, Bernard had a good hangover cure. Wonder around for a bit until we found a spot with a group of men BBQing a pig! The four of us sat drinking Alvaro (a sweet fizzy fruit drink) and eating what felt like an entire hog roast until we were bursting at the seams.

The following day we had a meeting for all the TSOs and MSOs in Ghana which was fun as I got to hear about what everyone had been doing, meet John Stops who is head of VSO in Ghana until the summer and introduce 'ride the pony' to a whole new crowd.

Next morning it was back to Tumu. Now unfortunately you cannot buy tickets in advance for bus travel across the north (unless you are very well connected!) This means you have to get to the bus station at 4 in the morning to start queuing. If you are lucky you buy your ticket, put your luggage under the bus, grab an egg sandwich, get in your seat and set off by 6. If you're lucky. Now roads between Wa and Bolga are troublesome to say the least. They are not tarred, often have huge potholes, random animals, construction work, diversions and the odd bit of road missing which is filled with bits of debris. Not for the feint-hearted. The buses are all falling apart. They are the ones that are no longer fit for service in the south so are shipped up north until they break so far beyond repair that the company gives up the ghost and finds a barely functioning replacement. This means broken doors, seats missing backs, smashed windows and constant breakdowns are par for the course! Also rather amusingly there is a big poster on each bus ensuring the passengers that 'safety and reliability are their main concern!' This is accompanied by pictures of a bus running a minibus full of people forcibly off the road and leaving them in a bloody heap in a ditch as the bus happily continues its journey. I will try and get a picture of this next time I travel on one!

After 3 hours of bumping and banging we pulled into Tumu. It was nice to be back, but not for long! In three days time I was off to Wa for my next set of adventures. No rest for the wicked.

Homework: I was going to give you my post address in my Tumu blog but that has been put on the backburner. I have managed to acquire myself a PO Box at Tumu post office and it actually works! I promise that once life settles down I will do my level best to write a reply to every letter that I get! Not only that I will be creating a letter wall where all your letters will be displayed! So your homework this week is to send me a letter. Over the next two years I will inevitably go through some major crashes and the odd letter will massively cheer me up. If you're at a loss about what to write do one of the following:

1. Write about your day to day life, (much more interesting to me then you may think)

2. Write in the equivalent of an M and S ad about a bacon and cheese sandwich. (I think this is what will dominate my dreams in coming months)

3. A poem/limerick!

4. Just about how great I am!

5. Anything!!!!!!!

My address is:

James Heale,

VSO Volunteer,

PO Box 18,

Tumu,

Upper West Region,

Ghana,

West Africa.

I have no idea why you have to add my job title but the post office woman told me to and her word is law!

Looking forward to checking my PO Box in the near future!

Jim xxx