We woke at 5am from our hot sweaty sleep and I headed for the bathroom. Luckily last night after thinking there was no water I found the taps under the sink .....so we were able to have cold showers ( there was no hot water and this was probably a bonus after the initial shock!).
Breakfast was in the dark - still no power - so we took the table outside into the cool half light and had omelette and toast with some lovely fresh pineapple - the sweetest we have ever tasted - so here begins my love affair with Ghanian fruit.
This was our first full day in Ghana, so after breakfast we headed to the nearby Shai Hills reserve, an expanse of Savannah, grassland and woodland. The bird viewing here is excellent and we saw the grey hornbill, white crowned cliff chat, swallow tailed bee-eaters, the lovely blue bellied roller, yellow crowned gonolek, black cap babblers, Senegal parrot, and the western plantain eater amongst other species.
We also had our first ever sighting of the kob - an antelope that looked a little like the lechwe of East Africa (today's photo.) We also went into the caves with a guide that used to be the home of the Shai people who were expelled by the British in our colonial, "it's ours so we can", era and saw a colony of tomb bats. I squeezed
through a very small gap to see the larger colony, John sensibly stayed behind. I realised the damp stone wall I was clasping was wet and crystalline due to bat urine and the soft footing was due to bat dung - a great sight but once back in the van I washed with water and vigorously used the antiseptic wet wipes.
We headed back to the hotel for a fish and chip lunch - great chips not so sure about the fish - it was very bony and stayed on my plate followed by more lovely pineapple. After lunch we departed for Ghana's only Wet Evergreen Upper Guinea Rainforest at Ankasa which was over a 6 hour drive - that's all our flight was from London. We travelled along the coast highway from east to far west, not far from the border with Ivory Coast. Overall the road was well maintained the worst bit was the last which was a new road under construction and which will stretch all the way to Ivory Coast.
We stopped on the way for mangoes and the ATM -I had a small fright as it took ages when I put it in for a second time to respond -I thought I had lost it - a big phew when it finally worked.
The journey was interesting lots of toll booths with people selling all sorts of things to stationary travellers - we bought some fried plantain near in the last hours as we were getting hungry.
We passed through rubber plantations and pineapple growing areas. The other main crop here is cocoa. The west is alo putting its hope in oil production which is beginning to get going here - as welcomed in one of the port areas we could see some oil rigs under construction alongside traditional fishing boats. The coast is also only minimally exploited for tourism with one of two resort hotels.
We arrived at our campsite in Ankasa as it was dark, became acquainted with our tent, met the team Francis, Chas, Foster and Justin who would look after us and had supper before going for a quick night walk spotting the palm civets who were wandering in the canopy.
The park had a basic shower block so we continued the cold shower habit and went to bed and quickly fell fast asleep......a long day.