The Most Famous FISH MARKET in GHANA!! Eating Waakye + Elmina Castle Tour | Elmina, Ghana

So how do you do this? You break the head off a little bit and you get in here. Obviously there's a few spines. You just got to get in. I mean the whole experience is amazing. Oh it's good. Good morning everyone. I hope you're all doing amazing. This is David Hoffman from David's Bin here coming at you from beautiful Elmina, Ghana. The biggest fishing town in Ghana. If you guys don't know this was the first European settlement in the country dating back to 1482 when the built this castle. It's a fishing town. We're gonna see the fish market. We're gonna see the salt flats. We're gonna eat some food and we're gonna explore the castle. Are you guys ready? Let's go explore Elmina, Ghana. Ready. Let's go. I'm hungry. No. So we're gonna walk through the town now and right here we have two different bridges right? Pedestrian bridge. That's the old bridge. That's the old bridge but it's mainly pedestrians now and this one obviously it's for traffic right? So car traffic. And also the people come to welcome their friends who have come back from the sea. Okay. So they stand on the bridge to applause them, to clap for them because it's not easy to stay overnight or for many days on the sea. So if you make it back you mean you survived right? That's the main thing. Survival. Wow. This is incredible. Whoa. I cannot believe how many people there are here. Fishing boats, people, fish. Market's right there right? Yeah. So this is a river or a mini stream to the lake right? Benya lagoon. Benya lagoon. Okay. And at the extreme end that's where the women are doing the smoking. I mean they smoke the fish. Okay. And up there as well. So that's like a church? That's Fort Saint-Jacques. Fort Saint-Jacques. Built by the Dutch. Built by the Dutch after they took over from the Portuguese. Over at the top my hotel is right over there. They smoke the fish here and this is the never-ending market. Crazy chaotic. 7 30 in the morning and this place is packed. You know only one day you come here you don't see them like that is Tuesday. Tuesday is their sacred day. Oh. No activity here. So don't come here on Tuesday because you won't see this. So most of these guys on the bridge have friends that are coming back from sea. That's why they're there. They're just waiting to see if they make it back right? But some of them are boat owners. So they own the boat. They rent it out to a fisherman. That's sort of how this works. So we're gonna go right now into the fish market. This is wild. It's an experience. Sensory overload. Smells. Sound. The whole thing. My auntie is cooking banku. And this banku is from corn dough. Fermented corn dough. In the panty land they don't mix it with cassava dough. This is a Finnish product. You can eat it with peanut soup. You can eat it with light soup. You can eat it with any other soup. This is not cassava. This is just corn dough right? My friend it smells so good. Oh yeah. I'm here with Michael. Michael's a local. He's gonna be taking us around the entire fishing area. We're gonna see where they smoke the fish. Where they build the boats. Now Michael tell me a little bit about the fishermen. How this works. And you told me Tuesday's like taboo right? Okay. Welcome to Elimina fishing market. The activities we find here is mostly fish selling. Our fisher folks will normally go to the sea to overnight. Do all the fishing activities. Relax and in the morning they will bring their catch. So every day you know in the morning there's such a bricks business going on. So as you can see they are now trying to straighten their nets after bringing their catch. They are preparing for the next day expedition. One thing significant about the fishing here is that in Ghana we don't do fishing on Tuesday. Tuesday is a taboo to do fishing. Our ancestors institute Tuesday to be a taboo as a form of conservation. So that the fish can replenish itself. And also give the fisher folks a time to rest. To mend their net and also fix their broken boats. Who enter the market is to have a look at different fish or catch that they have brought. And also get to understand the daily lifestyle of a fisher full in Elimina. As you can see there's business going on. The fishmongers are negotiating and buying the fish from the locals. You can see all the pond filled with fish is getting ready to be taken to another place. Either to sort it, dry it or just preserve it so that they can send it to the interland for a massive sale. Yeah this place is bustling. I mean easily like 10,000 people right here. So many different fish vendors. You said fishmonger. Fishmongers they are the women who do the selling. They make more money than the fisher folks themselves. Wow. So it's fishermen and fishermongers. Yes. That's what it is. Yeah. And here I mean just a lot of small fish. Like tiny ones. Yeah it means that this is what they've got today. Oftentimes they catch a very big fish from balacuda to tuna. Okay. Yes. So a lot of tuna here. Yes. Today this is what they've got. The next day you come you'll see a different species of fishes. One thing I have to mention is that when you come to this market obviously you're coming with a guide. You got to be very very respectful. You can't just go taking photos and video. Right. You have to ask and most likely they're going to ask for a tip. Yeah. You can't give them a two, five, whatever you can really afford. Yes. I personally can't give everybody five. I'm sure if you are to give everybody five you'll run out of business. Look at the number of people here. And the one thing I gotta also mention is that this is a real exotic market. You know obviously it's a wet market. It is extremely wet on the floor. Yeah. There's you know there's juices, there's guts, there's oils. It's a mix. Yes. You know they're moving fish everywhere. They're cutting. So be aware of that. This is not for the faint of hearted. What is that? This is the cassava fish. It looks like a trout. It's like a big trout. Yeah. They even have much bigger than this. Okay. So this one has shrimp. This is the squid. Squid. That's cuttlefish. No no no. That is the squid again. They are not coming to take the squid out of it. Here is a delicacy here. This is what we use for our sorting fish. And in any meal you know that is what you use as a foundation. So it's something that we really enjoy here. You guys enjoy shark? We enjoy shark here. No no no. We sort it. So now we are going to head to where the boats are built. So we are going to see the artisan skills and how they built their boats like this. Really hard to walk through here guys. So many people. So much chaos. Incredible. The smells. The floor is really really wet though. Be careful. Especially here. It's a little flooded. We're trying to get through. Literally jumping from rock to rock. And over here we have the area where the carpenters right. This is where they do the boats. Right next to us we have a few people. Fishermen you know fixing their nets. Also more fishermen cutting up fish. Unscaling them right. And this is it. Oh wow. Look at this. Incredible. So it's the skeleton of the boat right. They only have the exterior so far. What you see is the beginning. Normally they use a very strong wood like they wrote the redwood or the mahogany. They build a skeleton like this and start putting their pallets all over to get to a point like this. Big boats right. And they're deep right. So the reason for that is they can store their fish and put ice on it so that it doesn't go bad. Because oftentimes they stay in the sea for days. And over here we're going to enter where they smoke the fish. And hopefully we find some breakfast. So these are the smoking area where our fishmongers smoke their fish. Preserve it and send it to the interland. And also for local consumption. So right here we have all the firewood they use to smoke the fish. And this is it. So they do it in like different layers. And the reason for that is to save wood basically. She's auntie Aba. She's the owner of the place. So this is a complete social enterprise. Because at the end of the day it provides living wood for a lot of families in the Elimina. You can also pick one from your hand. So how do you do this? You break the head off a little bit. You get in here. Obviously there's a few spines. Just gotta get in. Nice. Salty dry smoke. I mean the whole experience is amazing. Coming here seeing these women working hard. Smoking the fish. And then getting to try it. It's good. The only thing I won't use the head. The rest edible. But you gotta definitely break the spine out right. Get all the flesh. Don't get too close to the smokers. Wow. I can't see right now. My eyes. Gotta get out of here. Oh man. That's intense. I can't even imagine doing that every day. Oh. It's something else. Something else. Yeah. It's intense. Too intense. I'm telling you. Chaotic. Crazy. Amazing fish market. Seeing everything. We're going to eat now. I have built up an appetite. I am starving. It is 10 in the morning and we're going straight to eat. Thank you. Let's try that. It is so good for you. Wow. The best part is the tender part right. Yeah. Here we go. So I'm going to get a piece. So obviously they cut a piece of the coconut so you can use it as a spoon. And this is it. So the flesh. Like that. Oh that's nice. Love the flesh. The only thing is it's really filling. Like if you drink coconut and then have the flesh you get full. I do this usually in India, Brazil, wherever I'm traveling How much is it? Two? Two CDs. So let's say we are paying eight CDs. That will be a dollar and some cents. He got two. I got one. He got one. But dude I got four of that. I mean the flesh, the coconut. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So fire. Yeah. Thank you my friend. Thank you. So we're back on the bridge. As you can see it has died down completely. We were here over two hours ago when you know boats were coming in. The fishermen were pulling in all their catch. They were untangling the nets and now as you can see no one. They've all gone in. They're selling everything and they're gone. But the fishermen right here in this area have disappeared. I need some wacha. I'm hungry. So this is our spot. We're gonna have some wacha. Some rice, cassava flour, noodles, a fish like stew and some delicious paste. Spicy right? So because there's nowhere to sit over there we're coming to this back area to post up. So this morning we are having wacha. Wacha is rice with beans and we take it with stew. You can add macaroni and garlic, fish or meat. It's a breakfast. It's a common breakfast in Ghana as well. From coast, from the south to the north. Wacha is popular. All right bro. Let's do this. So the rice, the cassava flour. What's it called? The cassava flour? Garnet. Garnet. Oh yeah. That is some spicy, spicy sauce. I love it. The black one is spicy. Oh I love the mix. So salt flour gives it a nice crunch mixed with the spice of that sauce. Noodles. It almost feels like a almost like a dry ramen bowl with noodles. I love the wacha. Like it's phenomenal. I could eat this every day. Wacha is my favorite dish in Ghana. Wacha right? So you do like this. Just get some of that flesh. Mix it. Bro it's gonna be so yummy. I like the gravy they added to the fish. Wow. You know we are in like the fish capital of Ghana. You have to eat fish. You gotta be really careful though. This is hard man. Not so easy. And right in front of us we have an old church from the year 1900. And inside right now prayer is in session right? Yep. There's a service going on. Service going on. It's awesome. Like they're like going they're jamming in there huh? In a very different way. Yeah. This plate costs six cds. So a dollar twenty cents each. So good. You have to try this dish when you come to Elmina right here. But it varies. When you go to the bigger places you may not get this for six cds. Price will change. Also the fish it's so fresh. It's so delicious. And that curry that like delicious thing on top right? Sorry not curry. Shito. Shito. Shito. Sorry. It looks like a curry but it's shito. Black pepper. Alright. Next we're going to the castle. Done with breakfast. Walking straight over to the castle. So literally the same way we came. Cross the bridge. On the left is the castle. So we decided to cross on the old bridge. As you can see you gotta be really really careful where you step. In the middle is a mini market. Selling some shoes. Some clothing here. Some bags. Whoa man. Lots of holes here. Intense guys. Gotta be really really careful. So this castle very very similar to cape coast castle. Yeah. In terms of color. Older than the cape coast castle. Yeah older but similar in color, size, just the whole appearance right? Yeah. Visit before entering Elmina castle. There's like lizards everywhere. This was obviously a moat. So the sea used to be inside here. Multiple defense walls and here's the main gate. My man. Nice. What's your name? My name is Kwamena. Born on Saturday. Right now we are in Elmina castle. Built by the Portuguese in 1482. They first arrived in 1471. In 1637 the Dutch took over the castle with the support from the locals. Before the English came in 1872. As of now the castle is 539 years. This is the biggest and the oldest castle in whole of West Africa. And because we are in Elmina that's why we are here of Elmina castle. Elmina is not the name of this town. The frequent supply of gold the Portuguese were getting from here. They called this place the mines. Elmina. Elmina. Now it's Elmina. The actual name of this place is Ano Mansa. Simply means water. Per the records over here we are talking of 1,000 captives in every three months. In one year we have about 4,000 captives. And the slave trade lasted for more than 100 years. The rooms on the ground floor were used as storerooms. Later the Portuguese changed the idea to human trade. All the storerooms were being converted to dungeons where captives were kept. In this castle it was only the Portuguese and the Dutch they were here for the slavery activities. The English used Cape Coast castle. In 1948 this place was used as a police training school. That's why the iron bars the metals were placed. The policemen were using for training. They would just hold it to go up and down. Maybe after the tour you'll try it. You want me to try it? I'm good. So I think we're going to go to the dungeons right? Dungeons are right over here. And also this was like the general's house right? Or the commanding chief right? This is the cell for the freedom fighters. Just like Cape Coast castle any slave who tried to escape they would put him in here and basically he would die in here eventually thrown into the sea. Wow tiny. So this is how they were living and probably a lot of them at one time. And like basically go to the bathroom here everything here just stay here until they died. So sad. This cell was for the soldiers who misbehaved. Life in the castle was boring to them. Some of them were going to the town without permission. Others were fighting among themselves. They were kept over there to discipline. A few hours they were released. In this room about 150 to 200 men were kept here. At the same time they're passing to the room of no return. From that place they were taken to the ships. In Cape Coast castle there's one huge dungeon for the men and two dungeons for the women. Here there's three dungeons for the men just like this and there's three dungeons for the women. And obviously they closed off the the door of no return right? They closed it. They sealed it. And now we're entering the room of no return. Whoa they really love here. Wow. So this was sealed off right? Yeah. We are now in the room of no return. This is a gate of no return. In this room many of the captives they broke down in tears over here. Wet, bitter was seen their parents and other relatives were far from realization. Through these gates some of the captives were sent to America, West India, some parts of Europe for them to work in their various mines, plantations and cotton farms. The gate was very wide at a time of gold and ivory. When they changed the idea to human trade they narrowed the gates to restrict movement. About five or ten people were chained to each other. They were moving on a sideways like this. The sea was closer so the ships would be anchored at the shore before they would bring small boats to convey the captives into. Looking at the small size of the gates by the time they'll be here for one month, two months, three months they will just lose weight. They can easily pass through here. This is really insane guys. They narrowed it so much that me I'm super thin and I can barely fit through here. So now we're going to the female dungeon. Yes we are. And where is that? Across the hall? Yeah. On this side? Yes. So that's the female dungeon. What do they do here to the wall? Actually that's an architectural design. Okay that's architectural design. I thought it was like maybe like them like I don't know carving through or something trying to escape. I have no idea. I don't know. So about 400 women were spread out here. They were kept in the various rooms. Okay of course it's just a small dungeon. This is more like complex with rooms, right? Initially this place wasn't painted. There wasn't any color until 1979 when the castle was selected as World Heritage Site under UNESCO. That was the first time they painted the castle and it has repainted on several occasions. Most of the wooden aspects have been changed. In this room you can see a few different like rags, right? And the reason for that is because before COVID, people were allowed to come here and spend the night to basically feel what the slaves went through, right? Obviously with no guards, no one bothering you, etc. Just come here, cover yourself up, go to sleep, wake up the next day and see what it is to sleep in a cell. Reservoir. It covers the whole place over here. Whenever it rains, water passes through the pipes at the back and gets inside for drinking, washing, bathroom, etc. by the Portuguese. We are now moving to the largest dungeon for the female captives. In this room about 152 women were kept here. Buckets were placed at various corners for them to ease themselves. Some of the captives were weak. They could not even walk from the middle of the dungeon to where the buckets were placed. They did everything on the floor. Feces, urine, vomiting, blood and they slept in it. There were no mats for them. That's the original floor they slept on. Obviously this is a very emotional, dark place. Hard to really get the words to explain the feeling here. Just sad, really sad. And one of the things I gotta tell you about the floor is that this was originally completely like super thick in filth, all black. They've cleaned it, that's why you can see the stones. You know, in Cape Coast Castle, there's pieces where you don't see any stones and it's basically because it sat there for over 190 something years in Cape Coast Castle. So they almost never cleaned it and just let it keep rising. So each room has a different number of slaves, 150, 130, 120. But if you can imagine it, 120 women here, they're almost like stacked on top of each other. You know, you can barely walk, barely move and then literally just waiting for them to be shipped out. We are done with the dungeons. We are moving up to the next level where some of the officers used to stay. So please, we are moving. So this is where all the officers used to stay, right? Many rooms. This is bigger than Cape Coast, right? So all this is where they used to stay and from the top we have views over the entire town. And this is the view of Elmina. So we have a few cannons here. We have the other That's it, my friends. We explored Elmina, Ghana. The first European settlement in Ghana dating back to the 1470s by the Portuguese. They built this castle in 1482. So we started the morning really early, 7.30 in the morning, right there on the bridge overlooking the entire fish market. We saw the fishermen coming in, bringing their catch, untying their nets, you know, untangling their nets. Then we saw basically the entire market. I mean, sensory overload, lots of smells, lots of sounds. Women, you know, cutting fish, selling fish. And then from there, we walked all the way to the very end to the smoke section, which was the highlight for me. I mean, just seeing how they smoked the fish, tasting it, really, really yummy, actually. Just be careful with the smoke, hit you in the eyes. You'll be a little blind for like a minute, right? And then from there, we walked over, had some tender coconut, and then we went and we had tried some wacha. Wacha is so good. My favorite dish so far in Ghana, you know, mixing the rice, beans with the gravy, the fish, and the noodles. Delicious breakfast. And from there, we came here to the castle, right? Really dark history, you know, slave trade here. This is it, Elmina and Cape Coast. You know, I'm from Miami. I've learned about the history my entire life. But when you come here, you have to see it to really understand what took place here during that period. And yeah, guys, I hope you enjoyed this video. If you did, please give me a thumbs up. Leave me a comment below, subscribe to my channel for more awesome travel content. See you in the next travel food adventure in Ghana. Let's go!