Our Safari Trip - First Leg Elko to Accra

Dave’s assignment has already afforded us several awesome travel opportunities, but the safari may have been one of the greatest! I flew to the states in July to celebrate my parent’s 80^th birthday with my family.  As it happened, I was also able to attend my 30^th class reunion in Douglas, Wyoming. I was planning on flying back to Ghana shortly thereafter, but Dave thought it would be a good idea for me to stay and fly back to Accra with our kids (yes….I guess they will always be our “kids,” regardless of their ages).

So, after more than three weeks in Colorado and a brief stay in Elko, Benjamin, Daniel, Melissa, and I boarded the 6 a.m. flight out of Elko on August 3^rd. I have been really fortunate in the last year and a half to have pretty minimal problems with flying to Ghana, but this was not going to be one of those flights.

Boarding the flight to Accra in New York City is always chaotic….it’s just the nature of the people boarding the plane. They are pretty aggressive in terms of getting on the plane first, and they always have TONS of baggage. This was no different. Fortunately, I was upgraded to Business Class (yes!) and the kids were already booked in Economy Plus, which is a decent step up from Economy.  In fact, they were seated just four rows behind me.

The flight from JFK to Accra has become regularly full, and this day was no exception. As a result, the crew was asking for volunteers, which ultimately delays departure as they have to take the bags of those who volunteer to get off the plane (can you imagine trying to find bags on a big ole 747??) and replace those with the bags of those who now have a seat. It’s often at least an hour process.

Well, after that was all straightened out, the pilot turned on the engines and discovered that one of the instrumentation panels was down (one of three….apparently they need all three, ha ha!). A mechanic was brought on board to make the repair. While it is always frustrating to be delayed, I’m glad that the problem was found PRIOR to being airborne. We were now two hours delayed, but the problem appeared to have been resolved.

So, off we go. We pulled away from the gate and began to make our way to the runway. However, I could see there was an issue as I was watching the flight attendants. The lights in the cabin are coming on and off. We get almost all the way to the runway and the plane does a U-turn. We appear to be returning to the terminal. The plane stopped and the pilot announced they were having trouble with the lights in the back cabin. At this point I’m thinking, “Who cares about the lights.” It’s 11 p.m., just close your eyes and go to sleep (ha ha). Guess the pilot didn’t agree as he informed us that we were going back to the terminal, but not to the gate. This would allow a mechanic to repair the problem. Unfortunately, he was not able to fix the problem on the tarmac, so instead we pulled back into the gate.

The doors were opened and the mechanic came on board. After an hour, the problem was resolved. But, just as I had suspected, the pilots were not going to be able to complete the flight as it would put them over the number of allowable hours. The Delta crew was very apologetic and explained that a new crew would be called, but it would take several hours. It was now midnight, Eastern Time. The flight attendants agreed to stay on the plane, and they quickly handed out sandwiches, as the Ghanaian natives were getting really restless. They were pretty vocal about their frustrations.

Travelers were allowed to get off of the plane and walk around the airport, but we were told that there was nothing open at that late hour. Regardless, about 70% of the plane departed, giving the kids more room to stretch out. In the meantime, we were fed dinner, I watched a movie, and at 3:30 a.m., we once again pushed off.

Instead of arriving in Accra at 11:30 a.m. on August 4^th, we landed at 6:30 p.m.  In spite of the very long day, we were very happy to see Dave and just as happy to see that he had made us his famous Sausage and Potatoes for dinner!

After a wonderfully restful sleep, we took the kids around Accra….which is just not much. We took them to the mall, then to Newmont's Regional Office. I think they were all surprised at the difference between the very modern North American Regional Office and the rather primitive African Regional Office. Let’s just say that Dave’s office is: 1) tiny, and 2) stinks of mold. It has ugly blue carpeting and there is a bathroom within his office (yes, a public one for all to use). The building is actually a converted house, although Daniel pointed out that the house was actually quite large; but, not really what you would call a good working environment. Newmont has since moved to a newer building, and yet Dave’s office is now smaller than the aforementioned office. It does smell nicer!

Sunday night we were invited to Dave and Michele Schummer’s house for a bbq. We were so glad that we could introduce our family to several of our expat family. We greatly appreciated the Schummer’s for opening up their home to all of us!

On Monday morning, we jumped in the car and had Michael take us to Elmina, which is where one of the largest West Africa slave castles is located. Dave and I visited two of the castles right after we moved to Ghana and we thought it was something that the kids should see.

On our way back to Accra, we stopped at Anamabo for lunch. As we were eating, I noticed this guy getting up into the rafters. He had actually taken a ladder and put it sideways. He’s resting a plastic bin on the legs of the ladder, and is standing on the bin….painting the roof. Safety first, NOT! I’m pretty sure this wouldn’t pass any OSHA, MSHA, or any other kind of safety protocols in the U.S.

We had another early night, just hanging around watching the Olympics and getting geared up for a long flight to Tanzania the next day where we would begin our safari adventure!