Travel Day to Berekum

Sunday, July 26th.

We were up early and off for another long day of driving. We left Bolgatanga by 8:30 and headed south in our convoy of six trucks to Tamale, where we turned west and headed past where we turned off for Mole last week. As we drove west the flat rural farming land and the villages of round thatched family units gave way to a much hillier and lush landscape and the houses became mostly cinder block. There were patches of long stretches of forests but a lot of the time it seemed more like one town ran into the next in an African version of urban sprawl, but with everyone living in slum housing and the shops all being small shacks. This area of the country reminds me of Uganda and Kenya. It was a long bumpy ride as there are thousands of speed bumps along the route. We stopped for lunch at a nice road side restaurant. Diane and I went for a short walk to see a falls but it was not very exciting. As we drove we saw a couple of truck accidents in the hilly area. We arrived at our hotel by 7:00 and after checking in we went for dinner in the hotel’s really nice restaurant and then retired to our own rooms. We all have single rooms. The rate has gone up from 75 cedi to 85 per room per night because of the falling cedi.