Vacation, wish it would never end

We had our first weekend trip this past weekend! We left wayyy too early on Saturday morning (6:30 departure!!!) and traveled three hours to the Coconut Grove Beach Resort, which is a real beach resort. It's absolutely the most beautiful place I have ever stayed. There are palm trees, a wondrous breeze, little lizards that run around on the ground, white sand...ah. It was glorious.

Our welcome to Cape Coast was a delicious brunch. There were these amazing rolls with real jam and little croissants with chocolate fillings and omelets and beans and fresh fruit. And it was a buffet! So I got to go back about a zillion times for more. Delicious.

After brunch, we got herded back into our coach us and were driven into Elmina. I hate the bus. It's not that it is uncomfortable, but it makes us stand out like sore thumbs, as if we don't already. People just stare and point. Oh well. I love Elmina though. It's more what I thought Accra would be like the first time I came here. It's a little fishing city. All the buildings are close together and bright colors like yellows, pinks, and reds. People are everywhere and so are animals (chickens, dogs, goats, etc.). We drove past canals with a million fishing boats that are all painted bright colors too. They are beautiful.

We arrived after a little while at Elmina Castle, one of the major ports of the Transatlantic Slave Trade. We had a tour of the Castle. I had been there the last time I was here, and I remembered it so vividly. It's hard to put into words what it is like being there: incredible but absolutely terrible. It's unreal to be in the dungeons, to smell the awful scent and imagine there being three hundred more people in that single room, to see the well where the female who was chosen by the mayor would be publicly washed then snuck up a trap door to his bedroom, to be closed into a cell where belligerent slaves would be left to die, to be in the "room of no return" and see the three foot tall door through which the slaves would leave Africa forever. It's awful. It's amazing. Terrible. Like I said, no words can really capture it.

After that intense morning, we left and went to grab a quick snack. The restaurant that we were stopping at was built on stilts over a pond full of CROCODILES. Weeeeeeeeee. It was so cool! We were literally 10 feet away from them. I got some sweet pictures. It was so cool! It was one of those stereotypical "Oh goodness I'm in Africa! WITH CROCODILES!" moments. Glorious.

Then we continued out to Kakum National Park. We had a little 30 minute hike that actually was about 15 minutes, and we arrived at the renowned canopy walk. I say that it is renowned because it is one of those ways that NYU sells going to Ghana. There are pictures of people on it all over the NYU in Ghana literature. Basically, you walk on these bridges made of wood boards with rope netting on the side of you between the trees. The catch is that you are up ABOVE most of the trees, so so so high up! You are only even with the tallest trees. The bridges wobble in the wind and the ropes only come up to my elbows (most people's chests or shoulders). We got to see the absolute most amazing views in the entire world. I wish I could just go sit or lie down on the platforms on the trees for hours. It's thrilling, being so high, and it's just so gorgeous. Ahhh I want to do it again. If anyone ends up visiting me, we have to go (hint hint).

After the canopy walk, we went back to the beach resort and a bunch of us went swimming. Then we had a delicious dinner, that included some sort of seafood soup WITH CRABS. I was so excited. One of the waitresses took my bowl when I wasn't quite done, so I had to go back for more. And we had cheesecake for dessert! Ahh it could not have been better. We got to try some palm wine (which I don't even know how to describe--I think it tastes bitter? Maybe?). It's a very distinct taste. Some people loved it, some hated it. I wasn't really on either side for the night. The resort had made us a bonfire on the beach too, so we just hung around and waded in the water. One girl, Daniella, was holding a soda bottle and got knocked over by a particularly rough wave (the water was reallllly intense the whole time). She ended up falling and catching herself with the hand that was holding the soda bottle on a rock. Basically, she cut herself pretty deeply and had to go to the hospital for stitches. She's probably the sweetest person alive, so she was a really good sport about it. The rest of us made sand-castles and sand-cities for a long time, then went to bed pretty early. Sadly, another hospital visit happened that night because one of the guys, Joe, got really sick. He was a little better by the time we had to leave on Sunday, but we all felt bad that he was so sick. We seem to have had a lot more hospital visits the past few weeks with people being sick :-( Cross your fingers for us all!

Sunday, we woke up, ate wayyy more than we probably should have at the brunch buffet and went swimming. We waded in the ocean--the Atlantic Ocean, but the East Coast of it--crazy, right? But we couldn't go swimming because it was way too rough. We went swimming in the pool for a few hours before packing up to come home! We all wanted to stay longer.

All in all, it was a fantastic weekend. Now, back to the real world...of Ghana?

Crazy picture Alex took with my camera on the canopy walk.

Me on the canopy walk.
You can see how high the ropes were! That long horizontal line--that's the bridge we were walking on.
CROCODILE!
Fishing boats in Elmina.
Bats in the Castle.
Elmina. It's so beautiful, but it was really foggy out.
Elmina Slave Castle (the outside).