“Adventures do occur, but not punctually.”
The humidity is so thick I can almost see it in the air so the slight breeze has little effect. The sun bobs in and out, but all it does is highlight the haze. The last two days the AC was on so this morning I turned it off and opened the doors and windows to freshen the air in the house. Gracie likes the back door open because she is able to go in and out her dog door, but once the panting starts, Gracie is in and the air conditioner is on.
Last night, a red fox darted across the road in front of my car. Luckily it was quick as I wouldn’t have been able to slam on my brakes in time had it been just a touch slower. The fox was small, probably young. I haven’t seen a fox in a while, but the Cape has many. Come to find out, it also has bobcats for the first time since Colonial days. An iPhone film of one was taken by a man who saw the bobcat in his yard. He highlighted it in his headlights, and the bobcat stood long enough to be filmed. Wildlife experts have confirmed that it was indeed a bobcat, Lynx rufus. They are common in other parts of the state but were designated rare to absent here. The experts figure the cat probably walked across the bridge. They think this one is a juvenile because of its size. Last year it was bear; now we have bobcats again.
I have probably told my story before, but the sighting of a bobcat reminded me of my wild animal sighting in Ghana, and it’s a great story, worth the retelling. It was mid-morning, and I was on my motorcycle riding on a dirt on my way to a small village to visit a friend for the weekend. The road is so untraveled that the only car I saw stopped to ask me if I was lost. I guess a white woman on a motorcycle is as rare a sighting there as the bobcat was here. I told them where I was going and they said I was on the right road. That kind of made me chuckle as it was the only road. I kept riding until I saw what I first thought were men crossing road, but I stopped to get a better view and noticed these were hairy men on all fours. I knew right away they were baboons; there were about five or six of them. I was totally enthralled by the sight. I mean, really, in Africa riding on a motorcycle on a dirt road and seeing baboons would make anyone fascinated. I watched them crossing the road and was, I thought, far enough away, but one of them stopped, turned and looked at me. I didn’t move but immediately formulated an escape plan just in case it became a bit more than curious. It didn’t. The baboon joined the others and all of them left across the grassland and out of sight.
That is one of my favorite memories of Ghana. I knew there were wild animals, even elephants, still roaming the savannah grasslands of the Upper Region and around Bolga where I lived, but I never expected to see any of them. I often rode my motorcycle on the dirt roads just for the ride, but I never saw any animals close to where I lived. That was an adventure, an unexpected wonderful adventure.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: AC, baboons, backroads, bobcat, Bolgatanga, dirt roads, humidity, Lynx rufus, motorcycle ride, Peace Corps Ghana, red fox, savannah grassland, small villages, Upper Region of Ghana, wild animals
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August 22, 2013 at 1:20 pm
I would love to see baboons on a dirt road in Africa 🙂 I’ve never seen a lynx here but I have heard them, Officially we don’t have them here but on the mountain nearby, I guess they don’t care about official statistics 🙂
Bears rarely comes down this far south but it happens and then every nut head in tha country drives around trying to find them, stressing the animal so much it becomes dangerous and they have to shoot it. people tends to believe bears ar cuddly animals, they aren’t 🙂 No one has ever been killed by a wolf (that we also have nearby) but several have been killed by bears.
We’ve had a rather wonderful warm and sunny day here and now the slight breeze we had has stopped. The sound from the katydids are so high it almost keeps away all other sounds 🙂
Have a great day!
Christer.
August 22, 2013 at 1:39 pm
Christer,
The animals, the bobcat, looked small just sitting on a rock in the guy’s backyard. The local wildlife center has installed some motion cameras there in case the animal comes back.
They trapped the bear here as there are no others, and it needed to be back in the western part of the state where it could find some. The bear was a young male. It survived it all and was let loose in the right environment to find himself a cute she bear.
The day is really still and humid.
Have a wonderful evening!
August 22, 2013 at 5:58 pm
Coming back from Tamale once. I was on my moto and also saw a troop of baboons crossing the road (paved). Maybe it was the same group. It was the only wildlife I saw in three years.
August 22, 2013 at 6:45 pm
Bill,
My baboons were in the other direction, north of Bolga. I was on my way to visit Nancy (?) a volunteer who was a nurse in a small village. She had transferred there after the first year.
Looks as if there were more critters from the simian family than we knew.
August 23, 2013 at 1:08 pm
Nancy may have been Nancy Flynn. I thought she was a volunteer in the 1971-73 group.. During the coup of 1972, Nancy was stuck in Upper Volta and wasn’t allowed to cross the border back to Ghana. The border authorities called our school, and I traveled to Paga to vouch for her and bring her back to Bolga.
There was another nurse in our group, Judy Beddow, who traveled around in a grey Citroen, and lived locally. She came to the house once to give us booster shots. So I’m not sure which nurse you mean.
August 23, 2013 at 5:41 pm
Bill,
It was Nancy Beddow. She lived in a village, a really small village, not all that far from Bolga. She wasn’t there my first year, only my second. I remember she and the PC nurse came to my house at one point and said they had gotten stoned in Tamale. I didn’t say a word. Then one of them said there were a couple of guys throwing rocks.
August 22, 2013 at 11:07 pm
Our neighborhood was invaded by a possum several years ago. I didn’t want to meet the creature in the alley at night while taking out the trash. I think they are nocturnal animals because I never saw one during the day. I understand that they can be really mean critters. I never saw him during daylight hours but I did see him at night lurking around the trash containers. He or she has long since left the neighborhood on its own or was captured by animal control and escorted out of town.
The cooler weather has moved elsewhere and we are back up in the high 90s without even a hint of a rain shower.
August 23, 2013 at 10:44 am
Bob,
A baby possum hung around my deck for a long while. It hid behind the deck box, but Gracie knew it was there and tried to get at it. The possum was looking to enjoy my tomatoes. He finally left.
This summer Gracie was outside one night being a maniac. At the foot of the deck stairs was an adult possum and Gracie kept trying to pick it up. The possum was doing its thing and playing possum. When I got close, it got up and walked and Gracie grabbed it in her mouth. I yelled and Gracie dropped it. The possum played possum again. Gracie was crazed at this point and wouldn’t come when I called her. Finally she gave in and I took her inside the house. The possum was gone in the morning.
Your cool weather arrived this morning. It is a beautiful day.
August 22, 2013 at 11:31 pm
Hi Kat,
I love the baboon story. They can be quite nasty, I guess, so you were right to have an escape plan.
Whenever I see a wild animal that I didn’t expect to see or I observe some interesting behavior that I hadn’t seen mentioned in connection with a particular animal, I feel that I have been given a wonderful gift.
Life must be getting even tougher for the wild things if they have to move into proximity with us just to survive.
I don’t mind seeing foxes and coyotes, skunks, raccoons and possum. They are used to us. But the bigger, shier animals have a tough time making their way in an urban environment.
It was a cloudy, warm and humid day here as well. I didn’t turn on the AC but I did give it some consideration. All the fans were on, though, and that was enough.
Enjoy the day.
August 23, 2013 at 10:47 am
Hi Caryn,
I knew their nasty reputation so I would have scooted right out of there.
I feel the same way about the animals I see around here. Last week it was the coyote and the wild turkeys. This week it was the fox.
Not all that far from my house is a section which is all trees. There are houses on the edges, but there is plenty of room for wildlife. A deer once crossed the road in front of me coming from that area. The town has a lot of conservation areas so there are places where the wildlife can live protected.
The air was a must yesterday for me and the dog. All she did was pant.