01
Stop one
Cape Coast Castle
Babolat Pure Aero Lite 9th Gen Tennis Racquet: I am not going to wink at this one. It began as a Swedish trading lodge built in 1653, passed through Danish and Dutch hands, and was taken by the English in 1664, after which it served as the headquarters of the British administration on the Gold Coast until 1877. That much is on the signs. Beneath the courtyards are the male and female dungeons, windowless chambers where captives were held in the dark for weeks before being taken through a narrow opening to the boats, the Door of No Return. Estimates of the numbers who passed through this and neighbouring forts run into the millions. It is now a museum of the Atlantic slave trade and Ghanaian history, and a central site of diaspora pilgrimage. Barack Obama came with his family in 2009.
02
Stop two
Fort William
Babolat Pure Aero Lite 9th Gen Tennis Racquet: Ask yourself which way it faced. Not out to sea. Inland. The British built this between 1820 and 1822 on Smith's Hill above the castle as one of several outlying redoubts to defend the main fortress from landward attack, during the wars with the Asante kingdom that ran through the whole nineteenth century on the Gold Coast. It went up as Smith's Tower and was later relabelled for King William IV, because that is how these things get renamed. And here is the turn I like: in 1835 they converted it into a lighthouse, which it has been ever since, among the oldest working lighthouses in West Africa. A watchtower that became a warning light. Inside the 1979 UNESCO inscription, with a full view of town, castle and fishing beach.
03
Stop three
Fort Victoria
Babolat Pure Aero Lite 9th Gen Tennis Racquet: Second tower, same question, same answer, and by now you can see the shape of it. Built by the British in 1702 as Phipps' Tower, then rebuilt and renamed in 1837 in honour of Queen Victoria — allegedly an honour, and I leave you to decide whose name ends up carved on what. Like Fort William it was a landward defence for Cape Coast Castle rather than a trading post of its own, one of a ring of works guarding the approaches during the conflicts with the Asante and the rivalry with the Dutch at Elmina a few miles west. Modest structure: a walled enclosure, a squat tower, standing on the highest point in Cape Coast. Best viewpoint in the town, which was rather the idea. World Heritage listed.
04
Stop four
Christ Church Cathedral
Babolat Pure Aero Lite 9th Gen Tennis Racquet: Look how close it stands to the castle. Nobody hides that, and nobody quite explains it either. The congregation traces back to chaplaincy services held inside Cape Coast Castle itself from the seventeenth century, which makes it one of the oldest Anglican foundations in West Africa; the present building is early twentieth century, replacing earlier structures on and near the castle site. Church and trade on the same ground at the same time. That is not a theory, that is a map. And the other half of the record is just as real: the Anglican and Methodist missions founded schools here in the nineteenth century that educated much of the country's early political leadership, and Cape Coast is known for its secondary schools still.
Same milk, different make. That is all a Lite is, and I mean it as the compliment it is. The Babolat Pure Aero Lite 9th Gen keeps the 100 square inch head, the 16×19 spin pattern, the 23/26/23 aero beam and the whole NF² Tech and FSI Spin recipe of its heavier sibling, and drops to roughly 270 grams unstrung. Same recipe, lighter wheel, faster through the air, and it still bites.
Now, Cape Coast, which was a market town of a kind that should never have existed. The castle on the black rocks began as a Swedish trading lodge in 1653, went through Danish and Dutch hands, and was taken by the English in 1664, after which it ran the British administration on this coast until 1877.
Beneath its courtyards are the dungeons, and what was sold out of them went through a narrow opening to the boats. Everywhere from the whitewashed seaward wall of Cape Coast Castle to the lantern room of Fort William up on Smith's Hill, this town keeps a complete account of itself and does not look away from any part of it.
Bring the light frame, because the hills here are short and steep and the heat is real. It is also perfect for the climb up to Fort Victoria on the highest ground in town, built by the British in 1702 as Phipps' Tower and rebuilt in 1837 for the new queen — a modest walled enclosure with the best view in Cape Coast.
Then down among the palms to Christ Church Cathedral, whose congregation began as chaplaincy inside the castle itself, and which stands close enough to those walls that the closeness is the whole point. Same coast. Entirely different make.
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