I woke up at La Palm Beach Resort before the alarm clock ringed. The forecast was of a rainy day and indeed dawned gray. I still had more than an hour before having breakfast with the rest of the crew, so I decided to go for a walk on the grounds of the hotel.

As the name suggests, this hotel is located right next to the beach, which is called Labadi, though no tourist comes to this beach because there’s more trash than sand. I approached the fence and a local got closer and talked to me. His nickname was Coffee and he was an artist. He sold me one of his paintings and invited me down to the beach where a large group of fishermen were working. I went alone with the camera, not being sure if it was totally safe, though I knew that Francis, the hotel security guard, was looking down at me from the top of La Palm’s interior. Everything went well!

My new friend explained me that the boats take the nets to the sea and then these are pulled from the beach by the force of arms. The three strongest are at the end of the rope, sitting, always pulling and shouting the rhythm and all the others are pulling standing and taking turns forwards. The two ends are joining until some have to enter the water, when the net is already very close, until they have the fish on the beach … in the middle of a lot of trash! I was very impressed with the amount of garbage they took from the sea, from where they had to search for the fish…

If you liked this post and want to read more about my trips to Ghana or neighboring Ivory Coast, you can visit the following posts: