Takoradi, Ghana

This was a new port and a new country for us.

 
A city with infrastructure problems, including deep holes in the roads and tricky walkways.

A wide assortment of people trying to hawk a wide assortment of stuff on the streets to eke out a living.

We caught a collective van, called a tro-tro here, to Sekundi, which is a fishing village a few miles away. We paid the equivalent of a dollar for both of us--the driver tried to give us change, but we gave it back to him.

Many women had elaborate hair arrangements.

 
We walked down a busy path toward the waterfront. In some places there were goats that climbed the dirt hill on one side of the path.

In other places, the steep hill away from the shoreline was covered with primitive housing.

As we came down the hill, the extent of the handmade fishing boat fleet was surprising. Our senses were assaulted by the sights, sounds, and pungent smells of a large group of people eking out a living from the ocean there.

 
Everyone has a job from folding and repairing the netting to washing out the fish pans.

Some boats were even dedicated to doing laundry.

 
This nice policeman thought we had strayed from a ship's tour at the other end of the pier. We told him we had come in a tro-tro on our own. We continued our walk and talked to many locals along the way.

We wondered why a Norwegian flag was on a small fishing boat in Ghana.

 
Guys maintaining and building boats. All of these fishing boats were handmade using hand tools.

And then there were fish smoke houses right next to the fishing fleet, mostly women worked this hot, smoky job.

Low wood fires are kept burning in the lower ovens and then trays filled with fish were stacked many layers high over the ovens.

 
The women were quite friendly and some of them had babies strapped to their backs.

After a while, we began to retrace our steps up the hill to catch a tro-tro back to Takoradi.

One last look back... What an amazing scene!

This time, we were in the front seat of the tro-tro.

A traffic circle was decorated with a large fish sculpture.

There were contrasting images of modern cars with substandard housing.

Back in Takoradi...

Village Weavers (Ploceus cucullatus) gathering nesting materials.

A Pied Crow (Corvus albus) in an acacia tree.

We walked through a school yard.

A productive coconut water stand has left a big pile of spent green coconut shells.

Some tethered goats had tangled themselves into a tight bunch.

Bunches of Pied Crows work a yard at this military base housing project.

We found a bench near this plane for our lunch.

Military families pose for photos across from our bench.

We walked into the Officers' Club at the top of the hill. Dean showed his military ID and then this pilot, who spoke perfect English, bought us a beer. How civilized. He told us that his next assignment was for training at the same US Air Forse base in Alabama that Dean had attended many years ago.

After we wished our new-found friend best of luck in his career, we walked a couple of miles back to the port via the beach.

Along the way, we came across this fashion photo-shoot.

When we reached the port, since there is no walking in the port, we thought we were going to have to wait for a shuttle bus, but this nice guy drove us to the ship. What an interesting travel day.

It was just a short hop to our next port, Abidjan, Ivory Coast.