From the Palace to the Treetops – Grades 5 and 6 Explore Akpogong

On Tuesday, we set off together on our Grades 5 and 6 trip to Akpogong. After about two hours on the road, we arrived, settled into our rooms and explored the grounds. Each room came up with a team name, and we could earn points for our teams by completing challenges throughout the trip. After lunch, a tennis coach spent two hours teaching us how to get the ball over the net. We still had enough energy for some running games afterwards! After dinner, we had a little free time before it was lights out.

On Wednesday, our host invited us to the village palace for a celebration in honour of the chief. It was special to see the ceremony up close, and we even got to shake the chief’s hand! After lunch, we visited Ghana’s first cocoa farm. We learnt how cocoa is grown, took a closer look at the different parts of the plant and got to taste the cocoa beans ourselves.

A short walk through the forest then brought us to a waterfall. We enjoyed the cool air and spotted all sorts of insects among the plants. We were allowed to dip our feet in the water, though some of us ended up with wet trousers too! With thick green forest all around us, we felt a little as if we were in the Amazon rainforest. That evening, our teams had another chance to earn points at quiz night.

For many of us, the highlight came on Thursday. Straight after breakfast, we headed to the high ropes course. Some of us climbed higher than we thought we could! We also learnt about the different layers of the forest. Back at our accommodation, we had time to rehearse for the evening’s talent show. The performances had us laughing and cheering each other on.

At the end of the trip, we added up the points, and the winning team got to help decide how we would spend our final evening. We had a little party, then played one last game of “Infection” outside with music playing. Afterwards, some of us fell asleep pretty quickly. Others took a little longer. After three days in Akpogong, we certainly had plenty of stories to take home!