adventures in Bolgatonga

Adventures in Bolgatonga Feb 23rd

Where to start! We have just spent an amazing weekend in Bolgatonga; 3 hours north of Tamale in the Upper East.
Kim and I set off on Friday afternoon from the trotro station. We let the first tro go as we waited for the others to arrive; a good decision in the circumstances. This was my first experience of travelling on a trotro (a very basic minibus of variable reliability). It was hot and packed, we had the windows open but this made it feel like being in a fan oven set at maximum. We stopped briefly a few times to pay a toll and were then surrounded by hawkers shouting ‘pure water’ and selling fruit and tilapia and other cooked fish which the other passengers bought and tucked into.
We were nearly half way when we came across the previous trotro minus wheels and windscreen on the opposite side of the road! Phew- that could have been us. Everybody stopped to help and fortunately the passengers seemed to be unhurt.
Eventually hot and thirsty, we arrived in Bolga and found our hotel ‘Comme ci comme ca’- with its thatched hut dining area and noisy, but functioning air con ( at last a cool nights sleep).
Saturday
Up at 7.00 for the usual omelette breakfast then to the tro tro station to meet the others and choose the best taxi. We rejected the ones with bald tyres, no back screen and broken seats and set off to Paga, on the Burkina Farso border, with Fuzzy our driver. And a convoy of motos. Calamity- we hadn’t checked the engine and broke down in the hot sun. We were rescued by one of Fuzzy’s friends who took us to the Chief’s Pool at Paga to see the sacred crocodiles. An ancient story tells how a crocodile parted the river waters with his tail and thus saved a chief from his enemies. The chief then promised that his people would never again eat crocodile. There are now over 200 in this pool feeding on the tilapia and other fish and prowling around the village homes at night!

I shall let the pictures tell their own story. To my surprise I actually did sit on a crocodile but I was certainly the most nervous as I made the elementary mistake of walking in front of King Croc who then lunged at me with his gnashers!
The crocodile is lured from the pool by a whistle, which he thinks is a chicken, and then he spends his time trying to get the chicken from the caretaker of the pool. There is of course more than one crocodile, some lying in the water with open mouths and teeth showing, others disguised as large, mobile, muddy logs that creep towards you. At one time there must have been about10 crocodiles in our near vicinity , kept at bay by helpers with stones. Sadly for the chicken the crocodile eventually gets his lunch.

At the pool we were befriended by a local gentleman who decided I would be his new wife and have his babies in the traditional maternity hut. He showed around the hut and played the drum so that we could dance as would traditionally happen to celebrate a birth. We were then guided us round the village and shown how the houses were designed to confuse the slavers. My friend then dressed me in traditional fighting clothes and put me on a donkey! After all this excitement we went back to Navrongo for lunch (of tilapia) and visited the local market to buy tomatoes.

We spent the rest of the day at the village of Sirigu, famous throughout Ghana for its pottery and painting. It was amazing, so beautiful, so cool and refreshing. We wished we had booked rooms and an art workshop. Perhaps another time?

The countryside here is full of trees, and far prettier and more varied than in Tamale. There are also more animals- pigs wandering around, a few horses and donkey carts everywhere. Tamale is traditionally short of water (frustratingly we’ve just run out of water again) but Bolga has rivers and pools. It is a bustling and very friendly town,

I shall try to return once I’ve got over the journey!