The Best Weekend Getaways from Accra, Ghana

With gorgeous beach resorts, exciting cuisine, and plenty to see and do, Ada is one of the most perfect places for your next weekend escape from Accra. Where the Volta River embraces the warmth of the Atlantic Ocean and palm-lined beaches frame a portrait of estuary islands, Ada gives a hundred reasons to switch up your routine and spice up those Saturdays and Sundays. Marine turtles breed on the seafront, which is a stone’s throw away from the Songor Lagoon, a bird habitat and wetland area. If you’re into history, a walk to the 18th-century Danish Fort Kongenstein will do. There are no other places in Ghana but Ada where you can find an ancient Presbyterian Church next to a 19th-century missionary cemetery.

The fortified buildings of Portuguese, British, Danish, Swedish, and Dutch colonial engagements along the Ghanaian coast making up the popular UNESCO World Heritage Sites are here in Cape Coast and Elmina. Cape Coast to Elmina is an approximately half hour car ride, both with daily highs of 86°F (30°C) and lows of 80.6°F (27°C) at night. Regular fishing is organized on the shoreline, and inland is where the striking forest reserve landscape of Kakum National Park can be found. One more thing to do before the weekdays begin is to visit the International Stingless Bee Center.

Mole is the 1,872mile² (4,849km²) ‘eye’ of the second largest and the third most populous city in Ghana. Tamale is one of the fastest growing cities in West Africa, prominently mapping the links between the agricultural and commercial communities. The Center for National Culture’s stalls are colored with handmade instruments and artifacts, and come alive with music and dance performances, especially on weekends. The Sudanese-styled Larabanga Mosque gives you an idea how the 1400s looked. A whole weekend should be enough to see all of the above, as well as the local kraal buildings with conical straw roofs east of Tamale.

Kumasi is the belly button of Ghana and its center is the open-air Kejetia Market, spilling with stalls, food joints and petty trade chatter all over Adum. A trotro ride from here takes you to the biggest kente village, Bonwire. The National Cultural Center holds inviting craft and performance workshops, as well as dance functions every weekend. What makes the Prempeh II Jubilee Museum a starter for the appeal of Manhyia kingdom is how it is curated to give you a time-travel experience to Ashanti civilization of the past few centuries.

With an abundance of waterfalls, and lush green farmers’ paradises fusing into mountains that form boulders near the Volta river, the region with the biggest population of Ewe inhabitants is a weekend treasure. If you are into hiking or ecotourism, this is your place.

North of Bolgatanga is the small town Paga, populated by people with the biggest hearts in all of the Upper East region. Founded in 1400 by a young man called Naveh, who was saved by a crocodile while on a hunting expedition, the town now boasts of sacred crocodile ponds where visitors can play with live, friendly crocodiles.