Late breakfast for team Lipstick as they only need to drive some 140km from Cape Coast to Accra.
Nice road along the coastal area of Ghana and very little traffic until about 30km before Accra when the traffic again became chaotic like in any other capital visited so far. For anyone planning to do the same road please keep in mind that you can easy spend 1-1.5 hours in these bigger towns just to get in and find a place to rest . Traffic rules are non-existent or disobeyed so it’s the survival of the strongest and the strongest in vehicle terms means the bull-bar.
Have you ever been in heavy traffic, the pressure of the bladder building up and having no idea where the street will end? Off the high way into a little side street looking for a sizeable tree for cover and then a U – turn only to be whistled down by a traffic cop?
“What are you doing – you cannot make a U-turn here”
“Sorry Sir – verdammt nochmal- we were just following our navigation system”
“If your navigation system is faulty you need to throw it away”
“What do you want us to do now “
“Drive around the corner and wait for me”
Helloo ,this is when the torque of a 4.2l diesel engine really comes in handy because once you are around the corner you can really put foot and there is immediately some traffic behind you for extra cover and this traffic forces you to go with the flow -unable to stop for further good advice by traffic law enforcement troops.
Team Lipstick apologises to the policeman and hopes that maybe they can find him again in this 1.8 Million African metropolis to explain that they were simply washed away by Accra’s traffic tsunami….
A nice hotel was eventually found with the extra bonus of also having a swimming pool with a small bar in its proximity so the team had a few cold beers before visiting a shopping complex close by with all the shops normally found in a South African mall ( Checkers,Woolworths,Mr Price etc… ) The complex is called Accra Mall
Accra Shopping Malls with mainly South African shops like Shoprite, Woolworth etc……
A nice pub could also be found there called Rhapsody which is owned by a South Africa – a type of a sports bar and full of soccer fans from all over the world.
The Monday morning task was to go and find the Gabon embassy and a taxi driver was found who told team Lipstick that he know where the Gabon Embassy is – so off they went but some 30 minutes later realising that the taxi driver obviously was totally lost. He stopped various other taxis to ask for the embassy’s address but nobody could give him any more details.
“Mr Taxi driver are you sure you can take us to the embassy?”
“Of course I know it must be in this area but I have forgotten where exactly it is situated”
“No No I think we need to go back to the hotel and ask for directions and a change of taxis.
“I am sure it is just around the corner – let me try the next road”
Eventually back at the hotel the team found out that GABON has NO embassy in Ghana but only in adjacent Togo… L…
Next taxi and of to the Benin embassy for which the team also still needs a visa and this time a newly found taxi operator took them straight there..
What a pleasant service, fill out 2 forms, hand over 2 passports and voila:
Please come back at 2.30pm and you visas will be ready!!
They were ready and picked up that afternoon where after rest and relaxation took place in preparation for the German – Algiers game that evening.
A nice pub was found with lots of TV screens and the team watched the nail biting game inclusive of extra time and the Germans had a great battle to finally win 2:1 leading to late night prosts at the hotels pool bar…
Here some pictures from the last 3 Days:
Dual purpose road sign – also to be used as a small clothing store…
Left overs of gold washing plants in northern Ghana
World cup fever all over western Africa…
A Toast to Germany’s 2:1 win against Algiers
