Robben Island

Robben Island was the notorious apartheid-era political prison where Nelson Mandela spent 20 of his 27 years in jail. Because it's off the coast of Cape Town, within sight of the city but cut off from it by cold ocean currents, the obvious comparison is to Alcatraz. But Robben Island (seen here low on the horizon) is much larger, much flatter, and much further away from the mainland:


Since the end of apartheid it has been a museum, and it is quite cleverly done. First they take you to see this building:


But these structures aren't jail cells; they're kennels for the guard dogs. The actual cells, which they show you later, were not as nice.

Mandela's cell is of course part of the tour:


But perhaps the best part of the tour is the tourguide. All the tours are given by former political prisoners, thereby ensuring that the prisoners have jobs and the tourists learn more about life on the island. This fellow, who gave our tour, said he served seven years for helping smuggle weapons from either Zimbabwe or Mozambique (he was a bit vague about this, and may not have actually known precisely where the weapons were coming from) to the ANC's military wing:


The way he tells it -- and this is backed up by other sources -- while the prison was a harsh, debilitating place, it also forged close bonds among the prisoners and helped them improve their lives, as the ANC prisoners conducted literacy classes for those who needed to learn how to read and so forth.

Mandela, of course, came out of the experience as something close to a saint, referred to by all the South Africans we met, with deep affection, as "the Old Man."

He was in another prison by the time the last white president, F.W. De Klerk, decided to release him and negotiate an end to apartheid. That prison, in the wine country near Stellenbosch, is still a prison, but its gate has also become a monument and pilgrimage site.