Osu Castle

in #accra6 years ago (edited)
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Built by the Danes in 1661 as Fort Christiansborg, Osu Castle has long been at the center of Ghana's commercial and political life. From within these white walls, foreign powers have ruled, slaves have been traded, and presidents have lived. We took an excellent tour of the grounds, learning a lot about Ghana's history in the process.



Despite its storied past, Osu Castle is not currently being used for much of anything. Ghana's presidents had resided here since independence, but John Kufor broke that tradition in 2008, when he moved to the more modern Jubilee House. There are weekly tours of Osu Castle on Friday, but otherwise the garden and the castle itself are otherwise completely empty.

Our tour began through at the Presidential Stairs, which are prominently featured on the 50 Cedi note. The castle is still used for state events, and the carpeted middle lane of this stairway is still reserved for the president -- a fact which didn't stop one girl in our tour from running halfway up for a selfie, much to the horror of our overmatched guide.

We went up the side stairs, and toured the compound, seeing where Queen Elizabeth slept during a state visit, and the third-story window from which a servant leapt after murdering his master. (He survived the fall, and escaped to Jamestown.) Our tour continued into the banquet hall, decorated with portraits of every Ghanaian president, starting with Kwame Nkrumah. Our guide gave us a short introduction to each of them... a history I had expected to yawn through, but with all the coups and intrigues, it was anything but boring. Then, we moved to the balcony, and enjoyed tremendous views over the Atlantic.

Continue reading on our Ghana Travel Blog: https://ghana.for91days.com/2019/02/15/osu-castle/

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Interesting. This looks like a cool castle. How do you like food there?

The food very unique here ... not sure if you have seen our food post: https://ghana.for91days.com/ghana-food/ Things we never ate before :)

Very interesting castle, liked all the staircases. It is exciting to preserve and learn history no matter how bitter it might be. It is always a good reminder to try to do better. I must admit, I was not expecting structures like this in Ghana. It did not look like there are many people in the castle either. Are there many tourists in Ghana?

There a some German, French and tourists from the USA. Many of them have roots back here and come to see their motherland. Ghana some some interesting, historic buildings and some very unique mosques. Of course we're going to blog about all of them :) Thank you for the comment!

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