Cultural & wildlife holiday in Ghana
Description of Cultural & wildlife holiday in Ghana
This week-long holiday in Ghana allows travellers to tailor make a tour to their own wishes with transport and guides allowing for the perfect balance between independence and local knowledge.
Experiencing Ghana’s cultural heritage is incredibly exhilarating with the south of the country conjuring up opportunities to visit heritage sites and rural communities as well as watching wildlife within protected and accessible sanctuaries, such as Kakum National Park and the Assin Attandanso Resource Reserve.
Travellers are not only invited to experience Ghana’s cultural traditions and abundant wildlife but also to interact with friendly local people where untouched tropical rainforests and undulating hillsides providing walking trails that place you right at the heart of west coast Africa.
Explore the Volta region, along the Cape Coast and into the realm of the Ashanti Empire as you embark on a cultural and wildlife holiday in Ghana that’s as exciting as naturally immersive.
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2 Reviews of Cultural & wildlife holiday in Ghana
Reviewed on 20 Oct 2022 by Philip Harris
1. What was the most memorable or exciting part of your holiday?
Most memorable has to be the visit to Elmina Castle and Assin Manso (The Slave river). Quite distressing, to put it in to perspective, Hitler's persecution of the ethnic minority was spread over seven years. This European directive lasted four hundred years, and to be told the story by the descendants of the slaves' families was a real awakening, whilst visiting the dungeons. On a lighter note, we were told we would see the Mona Monkeys - yep - from about 10 cm away - fantastic to have these wonderful friendly animals jumping all over you to get the Bananas!! Wli Waterfalls - take your old clothes, as , if you are up for it, a real immersive experience under the waterfall - power shower!!
2. What tips would you give other travellers booking this holiday?
Time is negotiable. Forget Western timetables and expectations. Ghana is Ghana - GMT is Ghana Maybe Time! Expect to barter on most purchases, and budget hotels are just that. This is not a holiday resort but an amazing cultural adventure with so much to learn about yourself. Learn your day name ( the day you were born in Ghanian) and a few words such as thankyou - this is well received. When you get currency try to keep the denominations small.
3. Did you feel that your holiday benefited local people, reduced environmental impacts or supported conservation?
Purchasing Kente cloth definitely supports this community, walking on the Canopy in Kakum National park helps keeps this 350 km2 park viable, as 5% of Ghana is National Parks. Talking and exchanging ideas with Locals promotes international ideas and concord. I felt my presence was very welcome - the people are wonderful, I never felt threatened and would be happy to return at some point.
4. Finally, how would you rate your holiday overall?
This is a cultural experience and an adventure, not a relaxing holiday. Touring southern Ghana as we did was a valuable insight into the lives of these lovely
people and the challenges they face daily - such as roads, tropical climate and (relatively) a very low income. I am honoured to have been their guest for a
week and would strongly recommend this trip.
Reviewed on 19 Jul 2022 by Christine Miles
1. What was the most memorable or exciting part of your holiday?
The Eastern area of Ghana is the prettiest and most interesting area of the country. Loved the scenery. Highly recommended to visit. Well worth visiting the Cedí bead factory that is tucked away. My driver didn’t seem to know where it was but thankfully I had a guide book with me that helped us locate it!
2. What tips would you give other travellers booking this holiday?
I just did a 2 night/3 day tour since I had already explored the rest of Ghana. I can’t really recommend the travel agency since they got my dates wrong, changed the itinerary totally without letting me know which resulted in us back tracking and
generally didn’t seem to know the area well in which I was touring. There didn’t seem to be a lot of communication between the driver/guide and the agency. I was meant to be kayaking on day 2 but the kayak agent said they had no reservation for me. The agency made no effort to solve this and so I was unable to go kayaking. I had booked solely with this agency to have a stress free few days but ended up trying to solve itinerary issues with the driver. I probably would have taken a couple of extra days to enjoy the mountains and waterfalls in that area as well as visit the highest settlement.
3. Did you feel that your holiday benefited local people, reduced environmental impacts or supported conservation?
Stayed at a local resort near Wili waterfalls and used a couple of local guides to visit the monkey sanctuary and the falls.
4. Finally, how would you rate your holiday overall?
Despite some problems with the itinerary I did manage to get to see most of the things that I wanted to do. Loved this part of Ghana but I wouldn’t use this particular travel agency. 5 stars for the places I saw but just 2 stars for the agency.
Read the operator's response here:
Eunice.
Responsible Travel
Planet
This tour exposes you to some conservation sites in Ghana.We make sure that we do not leave any thing permanent behind as traces of our tour but rather carry all the litter along as a measure of ensuring environmental cleanliness.At Kakum National Park, we support the local conservation effort by the entrance fees we pay at the park.The fees we pay enhances the effort of the people to conserve the wild life and the park for generations. We want to experience the local environment at it raw so we do not allow our clients on the trip to leave the communities with any flora or fauna - all that you can take is photography.As a practice of responsible travel, we also encourage our clients to be energy efficient users. All lighting systems in our overnight rooms has to be put off before departure as a measure of conserving energy.We give clients on this trip the opportunity to suggest innovative ways of conserving energy to our local accommodation providers.
People
Much of African tours are about the people and their culture.Responsible traveling is important to us.We travel in groups with experience tour guides who have the local connection.Our site fees are paid to the local people who are the managers of the various places we visit.Not only do we create jobs for the local people through tourism but we as well encourage them to maintain their culture and customs for generations unborn.We do not patronize accommodation facilities that do not belong to the local people.We enhance our local connections with the local people by eating their delicious local food.By doing so, we leave some money in those commuities we visit.
On day 7, clients are given the oppotunity to purchase the popular Ghanaian kente cloth at Adanwomanse kente weaving village.The kente cloth weavers earn their living from the proceeds of the cloth.They are therefore empowered economically when you buy their cloths.Additionally, all the entrance fees we pay on this trip go directly to the local people who are managers of those sites.This is therefore one of our ways of fighting poverty through tourism.
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