Cruise to Nowhere - Ghana's Dodi Princess

Last week was our 18th wedding anniversary, and while a lovely intimate candle-lit dinner for two in a 5-Star hotel would have been incredibly wonderful (and incredibly surprising), we did the next best thing: we went FISHING!! I'm fibbing. We didn't go fishing, but we were on the water, and we did eat fish!

Sly booked reservations for the five of us, his best friend Eric (who coincidentally was a witness at our Manhattan City Hall wedding all those years ago), and Eric's daughter, Ashley, and our 16 year old Ghanaian niece, Francisca. So, early Saturday morning, we got up early and headed over to catch the ferry, called the Dodi Princess. Ahead of us was a leisurely trip up the Volta River to the little Island of Dodi and then back again.

We were warned that even though we had made reservations weeks ago, we should get to the ticket stand early, because it was still first-come, first-served, and likely to be controlled chaos. As the boat was "supposed" to leave at 10:00 am sharp, we left our lodge at 8:30 for the 15 minute drive. We bought our tickets ($20 for adults; $15 for kids) and stomped and clomped down the ramp to the boat. It was all too familiar, and I was getting flashbacks to the days when we used to ride the Staten Island Ferry (for a nickel! both ways!) just for fun.

Naturally, we were among the first to arrive, so that meant that we got to pick the best seats we could find. After carefully weighing the pros and cons of the top level (great view, but smoky, since they were grilling the tilapia up there) versus the middle floor (where they were going to set up the buffet and where the live band was situated, so this would be noisy and crowded, but the bathrooms were up here!) versus the lower level (dark and cozy indoor bar with A/C, which would get very crowded, but outside at the bow was a 2 foot high kiddie pool). Since we had four kids with bathing suits in their backpacks, our seating choice was a no-brainer.


So we took up two big tables right next to the pool, ordered some soda and cold Star Beer (I know, I know, at 9:15?!... but hey, it's our anniversary and we're celebrating!) and waited for the boat to pull out. And waited, and waited, and waited some more. By 9:30 am, as anticipated, the kids were driving me nuts (as in, "when are we gonna leave?") and I became a town crier, announcing the time every 5 minutes. 10:05... nothing. 10:10... nothing. 10:15... nothing. At 10:20, Sly (also as anticipated), went to ask about the delay. The answer, he was told, was because the event manager hadn't arrived yet, and the boat couldn't leave without him. I wanted to slap Sly's forehead and say, "Duh! This is Ghana! Everything and everyone operates on Ghana time!" but as I wasn't wearing my own bathing suit and prepared for an impromptu dunk into the river, I kept my mouth shut.

Finally, at 10:45 am, we launched! A minute later they filled up the little pool (directly from the river), and my kids raced to the bathrooms to change into their swim suits. And 5 minutes after that, some kid started to hurl in the pool, was quickly yanked up and out by his mother who allowed him to continue his hurling on the floor next to us, and then allowed him to go back into the pool where he proceeded to gift us with an encore performance! What was that mother thinking?! Can you say, "IGNORAMUS?!"

Naturally, my own kids were not at all pleased that I made them get out of the pool and change back into their clothes. What is it with kids? At what point will they be skeeved out by something like that? When will they say, "Mom, thanks for taking me out of that festering pool of vomitus and ensuring that I won't contract any tropical malady that that young boy might have been carrying and spewing." When will I not have to (over)hear, "Mom, you stink/suck."

As we waited for our second round of drinks, and when the waiter blithely walked over the steaming pile of yuch on the floor for the second time, I pointed out to him that it would be "nice" if someone would come and clean up that mess. Ten minutes later, mess cleaned up (boy still in the pool, by the way).

The live band that they had aboard was really pretty darn good, and not just by Ghanaian standards (which usually is equivalent to say, a pre-school class playing musical instruments for the first time), and they played a very eclectic collection of songs, even some I could recognize and sing along to (much to the chagrin of my 12 year old son and the embarrassment of my 16 year old Ghanaian niece). How can you not sing along with "You can call me Al" by Paul Simon? Did you ever catch the video of it on MTV with Chevy Chase? Too funny.

About 90 minutes into the ride, we saw people carrying plates of food and eating off of their laps, so Eric volunteered to go upstairs and investigate. The line for food wound, snaked and meandered all along the dance floor. Eric was in for at least an hour's wait. The plan was, that when he got close to the servers, he would flash Sly on the cell phone and I would go on up and get the plates of food for the kids. In the U.S., I'd have been called some not-so-nice names for line jumping, but perhaps because Ghanaians don't necessarily believe in queues, or else they just chalked it up to obroni arrogance/ignorance/adaptation), I got away with the move. Anyway, I had 5 food tickets, and I wasn't going to go away empty handed. In another life, I must have been a waitress in a N.J. diner, because somehow or other I was able to carry back downstairs, all 5 plates of food. The chicken was so-so, but the grilled fish was excellent, and I wished I had gotten all 5 plates of it... the boys put their most pathetic faces to good use, and I got stuck with their birds.

At about 12:45, we approached Dodi Island, and had to circle round it to the dock, where a handful of young native boys stood ready to catch the lines to secure the boat. The ramp came down, and the passengers made their way up a small hill along a skinny dirt path, passed some children singing songs, passed some more children doing some native dancing, passed some more natives singing, crossed over to an open shelter where some women were selling smoked fish. And that was it. Gilligan would have been hard-pressed to live on that island. Within 10 minutes, the ship was already blowing it's horn for the passengers to get back on (remember, we left late, so now the captain had to make up for lost time). If you ask me, 10 minutes was more than enough time to see the, ahem, sights.

On the ride back, the kids were starting to get tired, so they played quietly (I am sooo sick of rock-paper-scissors, I could spit!) or listened to their MP3s. I soaked up what bit of sun I could get. This being late December/early January, we're in the midst of the Harmattan, and mostly what you get is a yellowish haze. This is the view from the boat, in the middle of the river, you almost can't see land. Stephen King should have filmed "The Mist" in this stuff. He'd have saved a fortune!



From a kid's perspective, I suppose the cruise was B-O-R-I-N-G, but unless they could swim back to the dock, they had no choice but to deal with it. Personally, I liked it... I got to listen to good music, drink cold beer, enjoy the sun, I didn't have to cook lunch or dinner, do dishes or clean up after anyone, I didn't have to accompany the girls to the bathroom (thank God for teenage nieces); the kids behaved pretty well (no more than half a dozen petty squabbles), and Sly kept coming over (from his hide-away under the canopy) to kiss me and wish me happy anniversary.


Would I go "no where" again? As long as "no where" is with my husband and kids, then "no where" is where I want to be.