28 November 2014 ~ Heading to Robben Island

Listening to: Led Zeppelin ~Down by the Seaside


Our first day in Cape Town we had arranged to go to Robben Island. This statue caught my attention on the way to our meeting place with our tour guide.

The meeting place was the clock tower. Hard to miss with since it's painted bright yellow. Construction of the Clock Tower was completed in 1882. The second floor is a decorative mirror room, where the Port Captain could check on all the activities in the harbor. The bottom floor features a tide-gauge mechanism that was used to check the level of the tide.

 

Since the end of the 17th century, Robben Island has been used for the isolation of mainly political prisoners. The Dutch settlers were the first to use Robben Island as a prison. The name is Dutch for "seal island". Nelson Mandela was imprisoned here for 18 of the 27 years he served behind bars before the fall of apartheid. 

The ferry we took to the island.

Flock of birds.