Saturday, August 3
We arrived at 7:50am local time, in Amsterdam for a 7 hour layover. Five of us were not content to stay in the well equipped Schiphol Airport, so we took train into Central railway station. It's only a few stops train stops away, about 10 minutes.
Saturday morning and things are just opening up. A stop to a nice cafe on Daamstrat street for some nice coffee and some passable marzipan. After some more sightseeing, we're heading back to the central railway station, ready for our 2:30pm departure to Ghana.
You know you're in a special place when upon touchdown, the entire plane breaks out in applause and and cheers :-) Spontaneous happiness. A fitting welcome to Ghana!
The airport in Accra was reasonable enough. It was just getting dark, and quite warm and humid. The only trouble was half us couldn't find our bags. Also, one member of our group, Marty, was also missing since she left from New York, and had planned to meet us in Amsterdam. Her flight from New York was late, so she missed our flight.
George, Amos (Kofi?), Joseph, Emmanuel picked us up. We decided to stay in a hotel in Accra for the night. It happened to be 2 doors down from the US Embassy, which we are not allowed to take pictures of.
The room Peter and I shared was pretty close to western standards. It even had a TV, which never got switched on. We would not see another one for a long time. The shower had an immersion heater mounted near the ceiling. The 220V wire came down and was attached to the wall well below my shoulder as I stood in the tub. It would be interesting to learn what the building inspection process is in Ghana :-)