Last Friday we made the mammoth trip to Tamale in
preparation for our visit to Mole! Expecting the worst from public transport we
were pleasantly surprised with our metro mass bus, and our private trotro/mini
bus seemed like absolute luxury! When we finally made it to Tamale and our
group was a total of 15, we headed straight to the swimming pool for a quick
dip and sunbathe before making the most of the western food available in Tamale
– burger and chips!!
With only 4 single beds on offer in the Tamale palace it was
always going to be a squeeze and rush for sleeping space, luckily the ‘Bolga
Babes’ had bought their trusty foam so there was plenty of room for everyone
(or at least there was for me, Jenna and Tracy who all managed to bag a bed –
sorry Will). After a hot night we woke to start our trip to Mole, we all piled
in to the minibus summer-holiday-style and took off! We arrived at Mole and
straight away spotted the pool overlooking two watering holes and booked
ourselves on to a jeep safari tour. We were split in to two groups. The jeep
tour was incredible, aside from seeing a wide range of animals in their natural
habitat we were also able to get very close to the elephant, ‘People’s Friend
Number 2’ and see a croc – though this one was not sit able on!! We saw 13
elephants, baboons, antelope, crocodiles and an array of birds. Adam was
friendly, funny and incredibly knowledgeable – knowing the scientific name for
everything and anything you could point your finger at in the park, another
thing you should know about Adam is that he loves his gun, he clicked it into
position several times and even offered to let us hear the “noise of his weapon”
to which we all squealed excitedly like 12 year old boys (this didn’t happen to
our massive disappointment). The jeep safari cost only 10cd and was a fantastic
2 hours well spent, I would recommend to anyone to give it a go! Speak of recommendations…
That night, 11 of us intrepid explorers made our way into
the park, in the dark, to what is known as ‘The Treehouse’ (not before filling
up on more “burger cheese chip” of course, only just resisting “chicken carbon
blue”). The tree house was amazing; it was in the middle of nowhere and had
lovely sights and sounds of the local wildlife. We spent the evening playing
two truths and a lie, some very exciting stories came to light, although I forget
now which was the truth and which was a lie – Tippi’s Uncle IS the President of
Korea isn’t he?! The phrase “if you don’t laugh,
you cry” springs to mind and boy did we laugh, uncontrollably for some
hours, scaring most of the wildlife away probably?
When we finally settled down for a cosy night’s sleep all we
found were roll up mats and hard wooden floors/benches. The biggest thing we weren’t
expecting however, was the now foreign feeling of cold, I mean freezing! Me and
Will valiantly took a roll up mat each and a thin sloping bench and settled in
for one of the most ridiculous night’s sleep ever – I say ridiculous because if
you don’t laugh about it, you cry, right?! We all could not explain enough how
comfy and relaxed we all were (!!!) Having said that, I would 100% visit the
treehouse again. If you do go, take a hoody, some socks and a loaf of bread –
sharing a granola bar between 11 people was some experience for breakfast. All
this said, hearing/seeing baboons and hyenas in the middle of the night is
quite spectacular and an experience everyone should try at least once!
- Poppy
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