From Benin to Ghana

I am writing this on Tues 7^th Feb in Yendi, Ghana from the Yahaya Iddi Memorial Lodge (decent accommodation, so says the sign!), virtually on the Greenwich Meridian. Into a country at last where they speak English. We had intended reaching the main northern town of Tamale today but the dirt roads have been so bad since the border at Tatale, where it took 2hrs 30mins for Chris to persuade the Customs to allow us to enter the country with the vehicle, so the journey was much longer than expected. The longest border crossing so far. Our intention is to travel the further 97km to Tamale tomorrow, stop the night and find somewhere with wifi and then visit the Mole National Park the following day, staying at the Mole Motel.

Since my last long entry we have had adventures. Chris’s presentation to the students at the Centre de Formation Liweitari in Nati went extremely well, with talks on gas pressures, the power of hot air, a typical balloon flight and practical demonstrations with liquid propane, burner power and a small paper balloon, it took over 3 hours. We had our last night at the Retreat and left Nati on Friday morning, visiting Amel who had our permission from the Mayor to make an aerial ‘ballade’ from the bus stop as soon as possible on Friday morning! We are sure he had his own agenda and was trying to manipulate our flying programme.

We travelled the 45km to Boukoumbe on a fairly good piste through Tata Somba country and steep wooded hills which was very interesting and picturesque. Entering Boukoumbe Chris purchased a wonderful Somba hat adorned with sheep’s horns and cowrie shells which rivals his Naga hat from Burma. There were no signs to the Togo border, so we found a small track going in the right direction for the final 5kms. All would have been well had we not had to drive down a step in the rock to cross a bridge, which knocked the tap off the waste water outlet. No problem, soon repaired. No official at the Customs Post, so we drove straight through and were 20 metres into Togo when the fresh water tank dropped off! Chris was about to crawl under the vehicle when the Customs man turned up on a motorbike, took in the problem and returned to Nadoba and came back with a mechanic. After a couple of hours in the dust and water under the Enterprise, the tank was back in place and we continued on our way, through the mud brick castles of Kouttamakou, a Unesco World Heritage Site and across the Keran River to Kante, where we spent the night in a room at the Auberge Campement with fan and shower as it was so hot in the vehicle (36C) and we were short on water.

We spent 4 nights in total in Togo. Saturday we were in Kara, the capital of northern Togo where there was a big launch of a new 3G mobile phone network in swing. We saw lots of people with musical instruments, and part of the town was shut off to traffic. We had a very nice lunch at the ‘best’ restaurant in town, Le Douceur, under the shade of a paillote surrounded by plants. I had a head cold (probably brought on by dust) and did not feel like staying in town, so we drove out on the ‘rocky road’ towards Ghana and found a very pleasant nameless restaurant/bar/hotel on the outskirts of Kabou where we parked for the night and had a meal of spaghetti couscous with giblets! Surprisingly delicious and caused no ill effects. In fact we liked it all so much we braved the bad road for a second time and repeated the experience last night, filling up with water there on both occasions and had the vehicle washed without asking this morning.

In the meantime, on Sunday morning we explored the immediate surroundings of Kabou for possible flying areas. A sheltered valley leading off the main road looked possible, but it would depend on the wind direction as it was surrounded by high tree covered hills. We decided to drive the triangle Bassar – Sokode – Kara through the mountains of central Togo. The road Kabou to Bassar was brand new tarmac with taxi ranks along the route. No sign of any taxis though! After Bassar we were back into asteroid belt territory and the going was slow, but very beautiful, skirting the Fazao Malfakasso National Park and mountains. We arrived in Sokode, a very Islamic city with a very tall mosque minaret, late morning and saw there was an aerodrome. It took a bit of finding but we drove to the airport buildings and parked right under a mango tree to eat lunch.

When the assistant met man returned, he was very excited at the prospect of us making a balloon flight from the airstrip and called his boss who in turn was very encouraging. We told him we could make a flight either that evening or at 6am the following morning. We all had a rest, and then the boss man returned to say the Harmattan wind would be starting in the morning and the wind would be calm enough that evening. We prepared the balloon, and sure enough the wind dropped by the time we had inflated. As it was close to sunset and the little air movement was across the airstrip rather than along it, we knew it would be a short flight, however we had at least 6 mins airborne landing close to the dusty perimeter road. It was very dark for packing away but we had lots of help and then returned to spend the night under the security lights of the airport buildings. There was loud drumming and singing from a nearby village until 1.30am and then at 5am the mosques started chanting and calling in chorus. When the airport manager met Chris at 6 yesterday morning to put our flight details into the log, he noted the last air traffic recorded at Sokode Aerodrome was in 1999! We could not understand how such a quiet airstrip warranted 2 met men and a manager. With only a short flight we had no need to get more gas. We still have some propane left as well as most cylinders filled with butane, from refuelling from Gordon’s tanks at the Centre.

Before leaving Sokode we stopped for an hour at a little garage to get some small adjustments done on the Enterprise and the water tank refitted correctly at little cost. Chris picked half a dozen lemons from a tree. It was an exciting drive back up the International highway to Kara, climbing through the mountains with slow lorries on the steep sections, overturned trucks on the corners, and through the Aledjo Fault, a natural split in the rock, 10kms from Bafilo. Before leaving Kara again we did some shopping to stock up on fruit: mangoes, bananas, oranges and pineapples. Benin was short on fruit. We only found papaya (which Chris isn’t fond of) and coconuts if they can be classed as fruit, so after a fresh fruit famine we are now well supplied.

We have TV in our room – a rare treat. The only TV we have seen up til now was in Banfora at McDonald restaurant which was an interview with the president, who we saw the following day leaving Banfora with police escort. We also watched the end of an African Cup football match (Ghana v Morocco) in a bar in Nati, joining in the excitement of a Ghana win with the local supporters. The football was followed by a religious programme ‘advertising’ upcoming funerals. We were amazed at the ages of the deceased, one lady was 105 and most were in their late 80s. Natitingou was overrun with Catholic churches and schools, Pentecostal chapels and 7^th Day Adventists as well as the Evangelical churches, alongside mosques. The Catholic Cathedral had the tallest spire in town.