After we crossed the border we crossed Togo to the Capital Lome, again only a one-hour trip. In Lome we said goodbye to Aidan who had to head home because of work commitments. From Lome we went straight to Lake Togo. We wanted to go swimming and spend there. When we got to the guesthouse on the lakeside it was unfortunately full, surprisingly the only time this happened. The second and larger disappointment was the lake, it looked spectacular, a large mirror laid out in beautiful countryside, so inviting, just waiting for someone to swim in it. That’s what should have tipped us off; no one was, even though we knew it was disease free. Anyway, I ran in for a swim, first step in the water, it was warm and nice until my foot sunk deep into the muddy floor of the lake, I continued to wade out, still lots of mud and the water wasn’t rising fast. About 100 meters out it was up to my waist. Krista and I swam out about 1/3 of the way and the water was only up to my chest. The boats that cross the lake are all pushed across by poles, might have been a clue.
We decided to cross the lake to Togovile, since if we wanted to stay by the lake we would have to sleep on the floor and because the lake was poor anyway. We got two boats across the lake, a peaceful trip, it took about 45 minutes. Once we landed we set about looking for accommodation. This was interesting, the only hotel was very expensive, a man said he would take us to alternate accommodation, there were no real other places to stay and our hopes were looking a little down. We got to a house and we were told we could stay here on some mattresses on the floor. The man was rude, and he knew we had no other choice, so he wanted to charge us a lot for his mattresses on the floor. He was being very rude to the girls since they had the best French and were doing the talking.
As a last-ditch effort Patricia and I went to the Catholic Church Nearby. We were in luck, there were a few huts used for trainee priests, they were all unused now. We happily chose to stay there for the night. It was a frustrating long day with a few disappointments, but we found a nice little chop bar and had a good meal and a few drinks and melted our problems away.
The next day we had a tour around the town. The town is known for Voodoo and there were various fetishes for fertility, harvest, children, and protection, all old stone statues covered in the feathers, blood and what not of the animals that were sacrificed to them. They sported spikes, veiled faces, penises and other items depending on what the fetish was for. It was an interesting tour.
We crossed the lake about mid day to a different point on the opposite shore. From here we caught a Tro into Lome and then another Tro north to Kpalime. We had again decided to skip the larger city (Lome) and go to the smaller cities instead. The large cities of Africa so far don’t really have anything on the ones of Europe or North America. They are forced western ways of life on people who never wanted to live that way. Busy, dirty, polluted and just generally not pleasant. The villages and the nature are what do it for me in Africa.
Kpalime is about three hours north of Lome near the border with Ghana. It is in the coffee country in the hills, a stunning part of the country. We Spent a couple nights here and visited the nearby Kpime falls and hiked up the mountain. It was a great day, we went wading in the pool downstream from the water falls, enjoyed the views from the top of the mountain of the rolling green hill of the coffee country, unfortunately because of the Harmattan it was cloudy, so we couldn’t see too far, on a clear day you can see Lake Volta they say.
We went to Kluto next nestled in the hills really close to the border it was a gorgeous little village. We checked into a guest house run by an Entomologist who loves the butterfly population that inhabits the surrounding mountains. We took a 3-hour hike into the hills with him to see the area and the butterflies. There was a plethora of them in all the colours of the rainbow. The guide was very knowledgeable and had amazing ability to catch the butterflies and see some of them even though their camouflage was spectacular.
He had a small fenced of area that house a chameleon and a huge stick bug with very impressive wings, it was about the length of my forearm, never seen anything like it. The chameleon was cool, unfortunately it stayed green, pretty sure they can’t change like in the cartoons but even a little colour change would be neat to see.
We said goodbye to Mike and Krista who were heading north for a few more day before going back to Accra, they went back to Kpalime and the rest of us spent the night in Kluto. The next day we crossed the border, which was a sight to be seen. Nestled in a valley with a river running in between the two countries it was a beautiful quiet place. It was not the main border crossing, so it was quiet, and this added to its charm. We crossed into Ghana with no problem and then caught a Tro to Hohoe. I tell you it was good to be back in Ghana.
We met a lot of interesting characters in Kluto and Kpalime during our stay. They are full of Rasta’s and they grow things other than coffee in the hills, so there were a lot of very chilled out people. We also met a couple Slovenians who were traveling around for a few weeks and heading to Ghana, told them to look me in Wa.
I must touch on the food of Togo and Benin, the main staples where the same as Ghana but there were two exceptions. The major one is the bread and the fact that it is good. It like proper French bread and is good, compared with the sugar and tea bread we get in Ghana. They really need to figure out how to make it across the border; I would love to take it back with me. The second is the fact they make cheese, not sure what it’s made of but its good, no spectacular but better than no cheese. I guess it’s the French versus British cuisine, but I might be wrong.
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