Kumasi has the largest outdoor market in West Africa. It’s big in the way that towns are big. It’s basically a city in its own right, and you can get lost in a heartbeat.
Luckily, if you’re a guest at Chris and Charity Scott’s excellent Four Villages Inn, you can take a personal walking tour with Comfort – she’s a member of staff at the inn and knows every twist and turn (and most of the stall-holders too).
You’ll see people sewing school uniforms, fixing shoes with old car tyres, butchering chickens, grinding peanuts, picking through giant snails and carrying precariously balanced bundles on their heads – all stuff you definitely don’t see at my local hometown market.
I came home with way too much woven cloth, a stack of local football magazines and some hardcore Ghanaian hip-hop CDs.
I still think it was one of the most extraordinary trips I’ve ever made. And Comfort is an absolute gem – don’t miss spending time in her company in one of the most vibrant markets on earth.
'Jules Told Me' by Jules Brown 
Wonderful pictures and post.
Those giant snails have gone straight to no1 on my list of The Most Yucky Looking Foods I’ve Never Eaten.
Fair enough! The pic I didn’t get – a lot more palatable – was of the giant mounds of peanut butter that they use to make groundnut stew, basically a spicy chicken and peanut stew. How does that sound?
That sounds FABULOUS! I was once served mouthwatering chicken in peanut peanut stew by a Jamaican woman – one of my mouth’s unforgettable experiences! I wonder if it is similar?