We loaded up our rucksacks and paid the bill, which was 280 Cedis, that's a little less than £140 for the three days of dinner bed and breakfast and more than a few beers, and we left Rainbow Garden Village on foot at about nine o clock, with our rucksacks on our backs, for the two and a bit miles of relatively easy walking towards Abono. Despite the African sun beating down on our backs, it wasn't actually all that bad, although Mandy did say she wouldn't want to do it every day. Passing through the three villages added another dimension to the walk and once again we were struck by the contradiction between the abject poverty of these lakeside communities and the happiness and open welcome of the people we met along the way. Only the elderly seemed to show the strain of living such a hard life and I expect that sixty or seventy years of watching wealthy westerners pass through your life on a regular basis, as we were doing, would take its toll on anyone. And yet the last person we saw on the road was an old woman, probably in her seventies, although it is hard to tell, working in a ditch with a machete. She gave us a cheery wave and a huge toothless grin and shouted "Akwabaa Obruni!" "Welcome White People!"

Once in Abono after about an hour's walking we sat down for a rest, and to get our breath back. We wanted a ride of some sort to Kuntanase. We thought that we might have to wait an hour or so for a Tro Tro or shared taxi. Bearing in mind that this was a very small town at the very end of an unmade road and a good 20 miles from the next town we were amazed as we had been sitting on a little stone bridge for a little over five minutes when a taxi turned up, like they do and we got in. The driver took us to Kuntanase, where after a short wait in a very crowded and completely chaotic tro-tro station, we were able to get a Tro Tro to Kumasi. Mandy is still stressing out at the number of people who crowd arround us, all trying to help us and be in line for a tip. We are getting better at handling it all now and have found that you need to be a bit rude and totally ignore them all.

After wandering around central Kumasi for a while, we found the bank and made use of the ATM. Most Barclays have an armed guard on the gate here and it is a blessed relief to get away from the hustlers for a brief respite. We then decided to go for a drink, although we could not find a café, so eventually we headed to the main Tro Tro Station. Bigger town, bigger Tro-Tro Station even more chaos but eventually we found the one we needed for Nkawkaw, paid the little man with a big book sitting at a desk in the middle of the chaos. Our rucksacks were put in the back and we climbed into the back seat. Very quickly the little minibus filled up with people, and when I say full I mean FULL! There were four of us on the back seat with our knees squashed against the next row which held four. Each row had a specially built folding seat which lifted to allow the row behind to fill up then dropped down so that that row could fill up and so on untill all five rows were full up and three on the front seat with the driver. This bus had been selected for special treatment and as we drove out of the station a preacher stood up at the front and gave us fifteen minutes of fire and brimstone, interspersed with the occasional "Hallelujah" or "Praise the Lord" from our fellow travelers. Eventually there was a chorus of "Amen" from most of the passengers and the Preacher Man jumped off the bus in the Outskirts of Kumasi, no doubt ready to hop another bus into town and save another captive congregation. The conductor, (they managed to squeeze one of those in as well!) then put a video on the rickety video player tied onto the bulkhead with a piece of string and we delighted to a two hour film about an alcoholic Ghanaian girl and her brother who was actually a demon from the nether world. All very farfetched with a hugely overplayed moral theme but it really helped pass the time and enabled us to forget about our numb bums! We arrived in Nkawkaw about three hours later, and covered in sweat. Mandy had the privelige of using a Ghanaian public lavatory in the Bus station, and on that one we will say no more. We got a taxi to take us to Bertrams Hotel, described by our Bradt guide as "basic but the best in town", well it looked ok from the outside, and even the room looked ok, so that clinched the deal. The problem was that it gradually began to look seedier and seedier. It was when Mandy went for a shower that we wondered how bad the other hotels in town could be as despite there being a pleasant ensuite shower and toilet in the room, there was actually no water, all we had was a bin full of water which had been there since I don't know when, so it was basically head first and hope for the best. Once we were "clean" we opted to get a taxi to a nearby restaurant, which was really good, Cow Beef kebabs and fried rice washed down with a Star Beer, what more could we ask for. We decided to walk back and along the way John picked up a vagrant, who declared undying love for him, he sure can pick em. (This guy told me that he could play football real good and as I was from Liverpool could I take him back to England with me and get him a trial? He would be a good traveling companion and would make sure that no harm came to us in Ghana and he didn't eat much so wouldn't be too expensive. It was very hard explaining to him that I really couldn't help him. J) And so we got back and went to bed.