Today I was woke up at 5:40 by Mawuli at my door, “Jeanna, we are having a TMT (Tourism Management Team) meeting. Can you be ready in 10 minutes time?” Sure thing. The meeting was quick and simple. Then around 9:30, Boss (the tour guide) came and got me to hike to the ancestral caves that are located in the mountain that is to the front and right of my house. Beautiful hike!!! Boss showed me things like a frankincense tree, shea butter tree, mahogany tree…all of which have medicinal purposes in their various forms.
This is a view of my village about half way up the mt. You can see two houses on the back right of the pic. The front one is the guesthouse I stay in :)
AHHH...the view is amazing. Look at all the trees! ...I almost cried.
To the right is the path to Togo, the left stays in Ghana.
Boss, the tour guide, and me. Boss is pretty phenominal.
Pretty. The mountain is the one I view from my front window, but from a diff angle.
We get to the caves after about an hour and half (they said it takes 45 minutes; I have been told to take the amount of time a Ghanaian says and triple it to make it real time). The hike to the caves is beautiful; you look out over 3 of the Likpe villages and can see for miles and miles…trees and trees…it was phenomenal! And of course the best part is Boss telling you the history as you go and why his people settled in these caves (They were running from the Ashanti/Asante who were trying to bond them into slavery).
There are 6 caves: the first cave is easily accessible and is open, it is where meetings were held; the second cave requires you to crawl up the side of the mountain...aka hang on and step on tiny ledges. I wussed out about ¾ the way up. Boss was like, “Jeanna, clap for yourself, you have made it for your first time. Next time you will go farther, and the next time farther, and then you will be here!!!” He is awesome! Cave #2 was a look out cave. So on to cave #3 where you have to climb up the mountainside and then down a hole with a latter; this is where the ancestors slept. Bats and fire making stones…very cool; probably my favorite, maybe second favorite cave(pic below). Now to cave #4, the chief’s palace complete with the original sitting stool/stone. Cave #5 is the punishment cave where people were put for being bad…it is cramped and hot. The last cave is the spyglass cave. You must scale the side of the rocks…picture below…to get to it. Then start the vertical climb straight out the top with a kickin’ lookout over the valley (this cave might be #1 for me…it’s kinda hard to climb sometimes, but it’s open at the top an the bottom so the lighting effects while your sitting in there is cool). Once you are at the top you then must skirt around the side of the mountain to take the trail to the top. There is one very questionable part where you have literally maybe 5 inches (actually about the width of one foot) of rock to walk on; you hang onto the rocks and supplied “wire” and step carefully for about 15-20 ft. It was raining, so therefore slippery, valley below…I will admit that I was scared. But we made it and it was awesome!!! Great hike back down; saw 2 yevus (white people) on the way down. One guy runs a non-profit in Accra and the other guy was visiting him from the States.
Cave #3...where the ancestors slept. You climb through that hole and down the latter.
Climbing up to Cave #6. Pretty verticle! You hang a right about where boss is and then climb through/up the verticle cave #6.
View from the top to the other Mt.
Mist a rising. Very Jurassic Park
And to finish off a wonderful hike to the caves, you then hike down to the Wajakli falls. It was incredibly peaceful and beautiful!! Thick forest on the ground, large vines and ferns on the walls, and a beautiful fall streaming over the rocks. Got to eat a cocoa fruit..yum!! You just kinda suck the smear off the seeds, it’s really good; no wonder chocolate is so awesome!
Waterfalls that are about a 20 minute walk from my house.
So the day was wonderful; great exercise, history, natural beauty and 6 hours of quality talk with Boss. (The hike is only supposed to take 4 hours; we sat and talked in the caves as to miss the hard rains). Tomorrow is my naming ceremony before I take off to Ho. Apparently the villagers already know my name because a lady called it out tonight as Boss walked me home. Of course I just figured it was just a phrase that I don’t know in Sekpele (name of Todome’s language). But Boss said she called me by my name, but he would not tell me it until tomorrow at the ceremony, but that it means “we like.” Awesome!
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