We were back to 0530 for breakfast as we needed to get to Bobiri Forest and Butterfly sanctuary while the birds were still active.
Williams target was to find the dwarf hornbills that live here - I spied the first on a bare branch high up, the dwarf black hornbill, apparently it is often missed as people think it's a one of large kingfishers. The other was more elusive albeit we did see it flying several times and got it's eye and reddish head in the telescope fleetingly. We added three other new birds to our now impressive list - the western nicator, the Afican piculet and a flock of magpie mannequins. Just after 9am we set off to Accra and our final hotel which I had arranged to enable us to relax before catching our flight tomorrow. We didn't see the long tailed pangolin in Bobiri albeit William said we might see one for sale along the road as people like having them as pets hence giving the hunters a market. He was right we did see one wiggling as he was held up by his tail by a smiling lady with some young boys standing on the roadside trying to sell a few meagre offerings - they didn't seem to have much but were keen to sell this lovely pangolin for some much needed money. How do you stop this when the poverty is so visible and the need to put food in your families stomachs is an imperative?
We continued on our journey back to Accra, enroute we passed through areas with people trading fruit and vegetables as normal but also there were lots of stalls selling pottery and pestles & mortars. William bought a new mortar needed I understand to prepare the tiger nuts he had bought for making a soup. We tried some of the nuts - not my favourite they had liquid in them and tasted a bit like coconut - they are apparently from the nodules of a type of grass.
We had one final amazing stop about an hour and a half from Accra - trees full of resting fruit bats. They were by the road and in the heart of a community - you could however easily drive or walk passed and miss them. The trees were absolutely covered in them Photographs taken (today's photo is one of them) we continued into Accra passing one of the Presidential residences and some of the best houses I have seen in Ghana on the edge of the hillside over looking Accra. We arrived at the Africa Regent Hotel, our one bit of luxury this trip, just after 4pm - said our goodbyes to William and Pres - they have really looked after us well these last two weeks we couldn't have asked for anything more from them they have been brilliant. I was sad to see them walk off particularly knowing they have no more work this season.
Once settled into our room I went for a swim - the pool however was a tad crowded with young very well spoken Africans....this was our first contact with the Ghanan middle classes.
Dinner however was an upmarket version of earlier hotels we asked for the al a carte menu - but John couldn't have the pork chops, lamb or beef as they had none so he went for the carbonara instead - I went for mash and vegetables which was on the menu! We then waited for 45 minutes - when it did arrive it was lovely and plentiful - so we had to leave some and desert was out as we were quite full.
We returned to our room for milo and sleep..... the end of another travel adventure - we saw 305 species of birds and 37 species of animal (mammal and reptile ) including picathartes and the roan which were our high priorities - brilliant.