Going to Ghana - HELP!

I am planning a trip to Ghana in July and i wanted to know if anyone can offer
some advice:

1. I am looking for a good travel agency or web site to go through. what is
considered to be a "good" rate for a flight to Ghana - the cheapest i have
found is $1500 I live in NYC if anyone has suggestions please let me know.

2. Looking for a good hotel in the Accra area but not too expensive. I have
heard of Akuma Village ... if anyone has any suggestions plz let me know.

3. I want to go to the slave castles - i am curious to know if anyone has had
that experience and how was it getting there.

4. This may sound very "American" but do cell phones work at all there?

5. Even with the pills can you still get malari?

Any other insight please feel free to let me know!!!!!

On 19 Nov 2004 05:51:25 GMT, (Ballshapedworld)
wrote:

I am planning a trip to Ghana in July and i wanted to know if anyone can offer
some advice:

1. I am looking for a good travel agency or web site to go through. what is
considered to be a "good" rate for a flight to Ghana - the cheapest i have
found is $1500 I live in NYC if anyone has suggestions please let me know.

2. Looking for a good hotel in the Accra area but not too expensive. I have
heard of Akuma Village ... if anyone has any suggestions plz let me know.
I've stayed at the Hotel Wangara. It was adequate, but not great.
AFAICR it was about $50 per night. There's probably better.


3. I want to go to the slave castles - i am curious to know if anyone has had
that experience and how was it getting there.

4. This may sound very "American" but do cell phones work at all there?
GSM cellphones do work, and I believe that there is also a CDMA
network there. The GSM network is dualband, so any American triband
GSM phone will work there. You can either arrange to get your service
provider to set your GSM account up to Roaming before you leave, or
you can buy a prepaid card when you get there. I can't give you
definite answers about CDMA though.


5. Even with the pills can you still get malari?
This depends on two things:
1) Which pills
2) How responsible you are at following the program

The VAST majority of people who claim that the contracted malaria
while taking the pills are eventually found to not having taken the
pills when they are supposed to, or not completing the program after
returning from the malarial area. I don't know of anyone who followed
the pill regime (NOT HOMEOPATHIC REMEDIES) correctly who has
contracted malaria. I have been in and out of malarial areas for 12
years, and never contracted the disease. I always take the pills
(Doxycycline), two days before going into the area, and for 21 days
afterwards.

I do know of three people who used homeopathic prophylaxis who still
did get malaria. It seems to me that homeopathic mixtures might not be
as effective, if at all?

Any other insight please feel free to let me know!!!!!
Ghana is a very pleasant African destination. I'm sure you'll have a
good time.

Marc

"Ballshapedworld" wrote in message
...
I am planning a trip to Ghana in July and i wanted to know if anyone can
offer
some advice:

1. I am looking for a good travel agency or web site to go through. what
is
considered to be a "good" rate for a flight to Ghana - the cheapest i have
found is $1500 I live in NYC if anyone has suggestions please let me know.

2. Looking for a good hotel in the Accra area but not too expensive. I
have
heard of Akuma Village ... if anyone has any suggestions plz let me know.

3. I want to go to the slave castles - i am curious to know if anyone has
had
that experience and how was it getting there.

4. This may sound very "American" but do cell phones work at all there?

5. Even with the pills can you still get malari?

Any other insight please feel free to let me know!!!!!

Hi, I was just there a few months ago. I live and work in Kinshasa, and some
of my colleagues are headed back to Accra in a few weeks.

1. Can't help you with travel plans from the US, but fly with the major
carriers. We flew in and out on Air Kenya, which was excellent. The flights
that connect through Cameroon (Cameroon Airlines) are notorious for being
stranded there, so avoid those.

2. When you get there, you can always ask a taxi driver to show you some
places. There are LOTS of places of various quality...you can get a 5-star
beach resort with a floating bar in the pool, all the way down to a 1-star
shack with no air conditioning and an old mattress. I'd need to know your
price and comfort range before I could advise you on accomodations.
However, being a westerner, they will assume that you want the ritzy places.
When I get home tonight, I'll dig out my Accra map and give you some names
and email addresses of places and where they are. Tell me what price/quality
scale you are looking at.

3. I hired a taxi driver to take me along the coast. It was a full-day
drive, we paid him $30, and he stopped at all the castles, bought his own
lunch, and left us in the SW for a few nights at a cozy beach hotel. Then he
returned a few days later, and for another $30, he brought us back to Accra
to the airport. You can also rent your own car in town (easily arranged
while you are there) or prearrange one. I suggest you just do it while you
are there, from your hotel. If you hire a cab, DON'T do it from your hotel,
as the rates are about 3x what you can get by flagging one down on the
street. About every 4th car is a yellow cab, and all prices are negotiable.

Wandering around the slave forts is a bittersweet experience, but wandering
around the local towns surrounding them is very interesting.

4. Yep, and everyone has them. But be sure you have a dual- or tri-band. If
you don't know about cell phone bands, it can be confusing, but here is a
summary.

Phone bands are like radio stations...they are on their own frequencies. You
can't get AM on an FM radio, and you can't get a GSM 1800 signal on a GSM
900 phone. If a country is a GSM 900 country, you need the right frequency
phone to make calls. However, some radios are AM/FM, and some phones can
cover multiple frequencies.

Most of the US networks are GSM 1900, which is unique to the US. If you have
a single-band GSM 1900 phone, it will only work in the US.
Most other countries use GSM 900 and/or GSM 1800. "Dual Band" phones sold
outside the US are able to work on either of these networks.
Dual band phones sold in the US must have GSM 1900 (the American band) plus
one of those others. Ghana uses GSM 900, so if you have a dual band, be sure
it is a GSM 900/1900. Any phone shop can tell you what your phone is.
Tri-band phones have all three: GSM 900/1800/1900. If you have a triband
phone, it will work almost anywhere.
Korea and Japan have their own network, like the US, so to use a phone there
you need a 'World Band' phone. That has _all_ the possible bands, which is
why it costs so much. Its also why it is so stupid for kids who do not
travel to own one.

Bookmark this site for your future travels:
http://www.cellular-news.com/coverage/

If you have the correct phone, don't bother changing to roaming....buy a sim
card when you get there (about $10) with the PrePay option. You can load it
up with $20 in credit and call all your US contacts and give them your
Ghanian number. US roaming charges from Ghana will be about $3 a minute,
while a prepay sim card will cost about $.15 a minute to call the US, IIRC.

5. Absolutely. Pills don't prevent malaria, they only mask the symptoms so
that you don't feel so crappy. To avoid getting malaria, you need to use bug
dope and keep covered at night. Anopholes mosquitoes (the kind that carry
the parasite) bite only at night and cannot tolerate temps below 70F, so if
you are spending your evenings in an an air-conditioned hotel room, you are
safe. I have lived in Africa for 3 years, stopped taking Doxcylin almost
immediately, and have never had malaria. I use bug dope at night, never
stand around outside during the rainy season, and sleep under a mosquito net
in an airconditioned room.

Ghana is a beautiful, friendly and safe country. You can arrive with a
backpack, cash in your pocket and no reservations and end up having a great
time and seeing a lot of sites. Enjoy it!

--riverman

On 19 Nov 2004 05:51:25 GMT, (Ballshapedworld)
wrote:

I am planning a trip to Ghana in July and i wanted to know if anyone can offer
some advice:

1. I am looking for a good travel agency or web site to go through. what is
considered to be a "good" rate for a flight to Ghana - the cheapest i have
found is $1500 I live in NYC if anyone has suggestions please let me know.

If you live in NYC, buy the Sunday New York Times, and in the travel
section there are a lot of small ads placed by discount travel
agencies that only list cities and prices. Those are generally the
cheapest. Call a few of them and see what they can come up with. I
think you should be able to do better than $1500 but I wouldn't expect
to pay less than $1000.

Another option you might look into is to get a cheap flight to London
or Brussels and then fly from there. You could arrange with a British
or Belgian travel agency to have your ticket to Accra waiting at the
airport so you wouldn't need an actual stopover. Try
trailfinders.co.uk or statravel.co.uk.

Hi, those were some helpful information you got from riverman but let
me tell u what to expect from a native ghanaians perspective. this may
not be in any particular order to what you asked but its all
information.

1. about tickets to ghana, $1500 sounds about almost reasonable but if
you plan on going there next year july then its a bit too much. if you
can buy a few months ahead you shd be able to get one for $1200 give
or take a few bucks. i know cause i was there abt september last year
and got mine for 1217 after taxes and all that stuff. get any agent in
ny, most of them can get you a ticket, every time i go i use
northwest/klm and my agent here in austin, tx, gets me a good deal.
its suppose to be more expensive to ghana from texas than from new
york so i am confident you can get something reasonable than $1500.

2. if you can please get yourself an anti-malaria kit. probably
cheaper and better in ghana than here. just go to a good hospital, and
trust me there are many good ones there when it comes to such native
illnesses like malaria, example SSNIT hospital in OSU, in Accra, the
capital, is a good place to go.

3. for places to say, i wouldnt advice talking to a cab driver about
it. once they know you are not from ghana or you just came from the US
they would try to get their share in. they would give you ridiculous
rates and would send you to a hotel of their choosing. Don't get me
wrong, not all of them are like that but I would avoid them for such
questions if possible. there are lots of cheap good hotels around
accra but if you have any "ghanaian friend" you are going with they
may be of use here. i know of triple crown guest house partly because
i've stayed there before and it wasn't half bad at all.

4. the slave castles in ghana are always attracting tourism so i doubt
you would feel out of place there, at all. you would need a guide
though someone who knows the natives and who knows their way around.
they may try to get a bit more than they deserve but thats life in
africa, u just have to be careful and not give them too much, usually
5000cedis (45 cents) or there about works, you can be generous and
make a dollar which is about 9500 cedis in ghana.

i am sure i've forgotten some of what u asked about but i would just
write them later if you feel you want more information. ghana is a
beautiful, friendly country but safety is not so much of a thing you
shd play with these days, in any country. safety is probably the best
in africa (in my opinion) but that doesnt mean you shdn't be careful
how you act in order not to attract unnecessary attention. i do hope u
make that trip. its very worth it

ps. oh yeah i almost forgot about the cell phones. yeah they work in
ghana, not with all the wonderful additions you have here but you get
a basic line with conference calling (if you pay extra), you get call
waiting, caller id. and really thats all you need. and its best to go
with prepay like riverman said, they are much better. as for the
phones well ghanaians like to show off so don't be surprised if you
see some of the most expensive phones around just dangling in some
kids hands. phones are assets in ghana.

The cannibals'll eats you

The cannibals'll eats you