Where monkeys and humans live side by side

On our recent trip to the Volta Region, not everything went as planned and we had to stay over the weekend. We did our best to make lemonade from lemons though and took a little trip on Saturday. I wanted to show my wife and father-in-law some places I had visited about 13 years ago on another trip to Ghana when I was doing Eco-tourism research.

We drove north from Ho and by where we bought our new land. We went across some beautiful green valleys and then climbed into another set of mountains. There is a branch road here which would take you to the highest inhabited community in Ghana but we did not opt for that this trip. We continued down the other side of the mountains a little way to a spot called Biakpa Mountain Paradise Lodge.

Here there are some amazing views of a river valley and a wall of mountains on the other side. The prominent mountain with a flat face is called Mount Gemi. The Germans missionaries mounted a cross on the top of the mountain in the 1930s, which has become a beacon for Christians in the country. In reality it was a radio tower used to spy on the English colony of Gold Coast at the time.

Our plan was to take lunch here and continue onto the monkey sanctuary which is not far away. The place was very sleepy though and it took a while to rustle up someone to take our order and then it took about an hour for our rice and chicken to come.

Sadly the food was not as good as I had remembered probably just because the rice was not cooked well and the food was not so fresh. Sadly this is the way it is with a lot of the tourist gems in Ghana. They do not get the constant business to keep inventory moving incentivizing staff and owners to be at their best. It is kind of a catch-22 where the industry does not attract more visitors because of the lack of service but also the lack of customers stagnates everything.

We enjoyed our lunch under a mango tree and even collected a few before we headed off and down the mountain to Tafi Atome.

When we reached the visitors center we were told the monkeys were currently well fed and we would need to wait a little bit. It was hard to tell if this was the case or served another 2 purposes. One it gave us time to shop at the small gift show and buy some beverages. Additionally, I think we were waiting for a guide to come back who could then take us to the forest.

About an hour later we got our guide and took a short walk up the road with the guide called for the monkey before one group showed up at the edge of the forest and we entered. We purchased some bananas to feed the little guys as they jumped around the vines and jumped into our arms. We had to hold onto the bananas tight otherwise they would just take them and run off into the forest. Bjorn didn't know what to think about it as I held him and some monkeys in another hand. That suspicion of wild animals is probably a good trait for a toddler to have.

The community here lives hand in hand with the monkeys they have made a sanctuary out of the surrounding forest to protect them. It is taboo to harm the monkeys or anything about the forest as the people believe they descended from the monkeys. It is believed that there is about 3 to 5000 Mona monkeys living in the area. In the morning they go into the village and the villages feed them. In the afternoon they go back into the forest and forage for themselves or enjoy the bananas brought by visitors. The guide told us that the monkeys do not eat the banana peels so the village goats roam the forest and eat them. He also said in return the monkeys sometimes ride the goats to get around. When the monkeys die the other monkeys bury the fallen one in the forest.

From there we headed back to Ho. I hope you enjoyed our little side trip.