Ghana is often recommended as the easiest entry point into West Africa, and a ten-day loop through Accra, the coastal forts and Kakum's canopy walkway makes clear why.
Give Accra two days before heading out — the Makola Market is a full sensory introduction to the country, loud and enormous and worth navigating with a local guide the first time, and the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park offers a useful primer on independence-era history before you travel further.
The coast road west leads to Cape Coast and Elmina, home to two of the largest former slave-trading forts on the West African coast. Both are now museums, and the tours through the dungeons beneath the fort walls are sobering rather than sightseeing in the usual sense — go with the intention of listening, and budget a quiet afternoon afterwards rather than rushing straight to the next stop.
Kakum National Park, a short drive further, lightens the mood with a canopy walkway strung between rainforest giants some 30 metres up — go at first light for both the coolest temperatures and the best chance of hearing, if not seeing, the park's forest elephants and hornbills below. Ghana's roads are generally in good condition by regional standards, but hire a driver rather than self-driving on a first visit; local knowledge of checkpoints and route conditions is worth far more than the independence of a rental car.
