Mole part 1

(sorry about the delay in posting, the internet hasn't been cooperating and work has been getting pretty busy, luckily today I have relatively fast internet so I can post some pics. The next posts following this will be about my work and my village stay. Thanks for your patience!)

June 26

A couple weeks ago all the JF volunteers got together for some meetings, catching up, sharing, story telling, workshops, good conversations, and of course fun. We were together for about 2-3 days before meeting up with the long term volunteers for the in country meetings, workshops, and ultimate frisbee. It was a great opportunity to unwind and share experiences while learning about everyone’s placement. It was also a great opportunity to be a tourist for a day, and that’s just what we did.

We all met up in Tamale, the Northern Region capital and hub, had some food, then waited about 2-3 hours for the bus to show up before heading west to Damango. The road from Paga to Tamale is paved and relatively smooth, the road from Tamale to Damango is poor according to Ghanaians. The bus ride was pretty rough and bumpy, but manageable especially since we all knew that Mole National Park wasn’t far from Damango and awaiting our presence. We arrived in the evening after a long day, ate a late dinner and crashed. The day before I left I started to feel my health declining and some sickness coming on, and by the time I awoke in Damango I wasn’t feeling too good. Between the diarrhea, head ache, fever, and aches I managed to ride out the day of workshops and discussions without falling to deep into a negative attitude, and the strangest part was that these symptoms ranged from bad to ok. The up and down feeling of sickness allowed me to somewhat enjoy myself throughout the 4-5 days.

We were up early around 5am to head north to the Mole Park with high hopes of seeing some elephants in the morning. Luckily a long term volunteer, Wayne, was able to find a trotro for hire the night before to take us to Mole in the morning. The tro ride was pretty bumpy but we were all in good spirits: anxious to see elephants and a container of Ghanaian chocolate spread was being passed around:

Aline and Spencer living the high life

Very early and bumpy tro-tro ride into Mole

Mole is the largest wildlife reserve in Ghana, and after passing through the front gate we encountered a family of baboons on the road to the ‘visitor centre’, a nice welcoming committee indeed.

We got to the centre, piled out of the tro, used the nicest, cleanest washrooms in Ghana (nicer than my bathroom in my Windsor apartment) then were off with the armed ranger for a walk in the park

Cleanest washrooms and funniest signs!

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Ranger and our "field trip chaperon" Alanna (she's our support staff/coach/big sister)

While we stopped to listen to the ranger brief us on the parks history and wildlife habitants, to warthogs darted out of the bush and were running towards us. They turned about 5m before reaching us and took off down a path. We all got a good laugh especially because they have hair like 80’s rock stars, aka mullets: short in the front long in the back. He finished talking and we walked down an open path in pretty open forest. About 5 mins later near the worker’s quarters before getting into the forest/bush we encountered a heard of elephants. It felt like Jurassic Park with the buildings and equipment all around and a herd of elephants grazing.

We stood around in awe for about 20mins quietly observing and taking photos of the elephants before they slowly walked on by. Our primary goal had been achieved in a matter of 5 minutes! It was a great way to start the day, and thankfully in terms of my health I was feeling fine, and the weather was just about perfect this day: overcast and not too warm. We continued on our tour and got up close to some warthogs sleeping:

Further along our walk we came across a family of baboons ‘monkey-ing’ around, some antelopes, more baboons, and of course more elephants:

To be continued............