IT'S not easy to write about a place the entire civilised world considers an horrendous nightmare. Perhaps I was more prepared for Robben Island than some visitors.

Two assignments covering terrors of Auschwitz in depth, plus tours of Nazi concentration camps from Dachau, Germany and France's Natzwiller Struthof to Mydanek, Poland, had shown me everything from unbelievable suffocation cells to claw marks in concrete ceilings where prison-gassed prisoners attempted desperate escapes.

But no matter how prepared or forewarned, man's inhumanity to man always comes as a disappointing shock. It proves, as my brother Jim so often laments: "The veneer of civilisation is only talcum powder thin and it takes only the slightest breeze to blow it away entirely."

It never ceases to amaze me the depth to which some evil people will sink when something is perceived to be standing in the way of their power or progress . . . and that's unfortunately true in all walks of life.

Come along on a day trip to see what life on Robben Island was really like. The approach is very deceptive, actually quite scenic with all the drama of Table Mountain behind you as the ferry heads out to sea. Regularly scheduled tours leave the new Nelson Mandela Gateway Terminal at Victoria and Albert Waterfront in Cape Town and it's a trip no one will want to miss.

Eventually, the three-storey departure terminal will house an auditorium, museum shop, exhibition areas and a restaurant, with a variety of exhibits reflecting on apartheid and the heritage of Robben Island. It was in the final stages of development during my visit.

What many visitors don't realise is that island about eight and a half miles offshore has been a place of banishment and exile for more than four centuries. Anyone even remotely considered a political trouble-maker, outcast or misfit in the estimation of local rulers was sent into isolation and imprisonment there.

BUT what used to be understandably considered almost a life sentence is now one of South Africa's major tourist attractions. Modern ferries leaving the waterfront for the 30-minute voyage are usually full to capacity. Most passengers look at their names . . . Autshumato and Makana . . . and assume they have some local symbolism. Indeed they do, named after famous political prisoners in 1658 and 1819.

"It started out being used in early voyages to the East Indies," our guide tells his intent audience, "then became a dumping ground for slaves considered disobedient, and political prisoners." Many local chieftains who opposed Dutch and English confiscation of their land were also exiled here, and so were lepers and those considered mentally ill.

Of course, you were rated mentally ill if you disagreed with whoever was in power! If ever a place should be haunted, this "Island of the Damned" UNESCO World Heritage Site qualifies.

The tour programme is well organised, with almost too much to see in the time allotted. As visitors walk up from the dock, they pass through a large stone gate with a declaration proclaiming: "Welcome to Robben Island . . . We Serve With Pride." To me, it's in some ways depressingly reminiscent of the entrance to Auschwitz, where a sign proclaims: "Arbeit Macht Frei" (work makes you free).

First stop is the Maximum Security Prison, a low, rambling stone building where visitors are first ushered into the prison yard of Isolation Section B where major political prisoners were housed. Each tour includes a welcome, historic explanation and a question-and-answer period there with a former prisoner. The experience is a very compelling one. Eddie Daniel, the guide during my visit, was a member of the Liberal Party, imprisoned 15 years for sabotage against the apartheid government.

"I come from a marginal family," a light-skinned guide told his group of visitors. "I had a choice of being black or white. I chose black. I don't like to be categorised by colour. Colour should be abandoned and people judged on what they are."

As his explanation proceeded, we sat on chairs in the very prison yard where Mandela and the other prisoners spent time. A large display board has original pictures of prisoners, including Mandela, in that very yard.

"I was befriended by Mr. Mandela. He's really a wonderful guy . . . magnanimous. He helped me when I was depressed. There were days when we were locked in our cells 23 hours, then out half an hour twice a day.

"This was considered the punishment block. Inmates were given big blocks of slate to break with hammers into fine pebbles. Later we went to the quarry where we could take and get an education from each other."

This section of the prison was built in 1960 over graves from the leper era. Slate to build it was dug by prisoners in much the same way Auschwitz was built by its own prison labour.

Nelson Mandela spent 18 of the 27 years imprisoned here. He said it was "without question, the harshest, most iron-fisted outpost of the South Africa penal system".

OUR guide related how he'd become ill and wasn't allowed to go to hospital. "Mr. Mandela emptied and cleaned my chamber pot when I was sick. That's the kind of person he was. A man of his importance could have asked someone else to do it."

"Educated blacks were especially persecuted. One, Johnson Malumbo, was forced to dig a hole, then buried up to his neck for days. After days, the warden asked if he was thirsty, then urinated on him.

"One prisoner spilled soup on a warden's trousers and was sentenced to six cuts naked and it actually cut his skin. He refused to show pain and the warden was disappointed. Besides all this, we were very poorly dressed in shorts, sandals, no stockings, short-sleeved shirts and in our windswept island winter, there's nothing between Cape Town to the South Pole . . . it gets cold out there."

What about food? "So terrible there were hunger strikes. We got little food poorly prepared and dirty. They wanted to destroy our morale. We agitated and got political prisoners to work in the kitchen and things improved."

Visitors are then guided through the isolation cell block and everyone paused in front of the one occupied by Nelson Mandela for 18 years . . . a claustrophobic 2.7 metres by 1.8 metres. Until he became seriously ill, bed was a thin mat spread on a cold concrete floor, then he was allowed a cot.

"He set a wonderful example on how to survive," Eddie Daniel recalled. "His philosophy was, 'Each one teach one', and we would study after hard labour in the quarry . . . but wardens turned lights out at 6.30 p.m. Rules were strict. When the Red Cross came in 1978 they insisted dog kennels could no longer be used to incarcerate people."

Actually, it comes as a surprise how much else there is to see beside the prison which housed more than 3,000 freedom fighter prisoners from 1962 to 1991. There is time to visit other cell blocks where actual cell-story displays and photos recall horrors of life there.

Then it's on to buses for an extensive 45-minute drive around the rocky 1,150-acre island. It's a bright blue-sky day with Table Mountain and Cape Town clearly visible across the sea. Setting is reminiscent of the prison of Chateau de If off Marseilles, France, which inspired Alexandre Dumas' Count of Monte Cristo . . . so close to civilisation, yet so far away!

There are many sights along the way where I'd like to have lingered for closer inspection and by now that should be possible. Plans were under way to actually make accommodations available on Robben Island for those wanting more in-depth exploration.

"We expect to have some top-notch overnight locations and service for guests, as well as basic accommodations. There will also be conference venues, seminar areas and walking tours," explained an official involved in the island's development as a major visitor site. "The Maximum Security Prison Hall is already available for group meetings, so is the British Commissioner's 1892 Victorian Residence."

The Lepers Church, designed by Cecil Rhodes' favourite architect, Sir Herbert Baker, near the turn of the century, and its graveyard looked very well maintained viewed from the moving bus. Reading some of the tombstones would have been interesting. Lepers were banished here from 1846 to 1931 under the Leprosy Repression Act and never allowed back to the mainland.

The house where Robert Sobukwe, president of the Pan Africanist Congress, was imprisoned is also a drive-by. He was brought here from Pretoria after his vigorous protests against restricted movement of black people under the passcard system, and was not allowed to speak to anyone, but permitted one visitor annually. Eventually sent to Kimberley under house arrest, he died of lung cancer in 1978.

The tour continued past fortifications built during World War Two, with views of big gun emplacements intended to protect Cape Town from invaders. There's a quick look at a shrine built in memory of a Muslim cleric imprisoned here by the Dutch in the 17th century. He was later released and introduced Islam to Cape Town slaves.

Some 14,000 African penguins and a variety of rare seabirds and animal species roam the island. There's even a dramatic lighthouse and views of shipwrecks. All very interesting and unexpected.

BUT Jan van Reeback's lime quarry is not a happy site. Dating back to 1663, it was quarried by slave labour, mixed with crushed shells and used as cement in constructing massive Castle of Good Hope in Cape Town. It also became a worksite for political prisoners in the 1960s, '70s and '80s, including Nelson Mandela who worked there with pick and shovel.

Even with dark sunglasses and a broad-brimmed straw hat, sun was almost blinding reflecting off quarry walls. Denied any visual protection from that blistering sun, many former prisoners are now victims of vision problems. There were also two other stone quarries soon to be opened to visitors.

In February 1995, Nelson Mandela called former political prisoners to come here and celebrate after the election. They came with wives and children and he led them down to the lime quarry. He picked up a rock and each former prisoner followed his example, building a symbolic, much photographed rock cairn at the quarry entrance.

"We consider it a symbol of the human spirit's triumph over adversity," he said. Amazingly, after all he suffered in this prison, Mandela was able to be forgiving towards those who had caused him so much pain.

There's a Museum Shop on the dock and an Information Centre housed in the former X-Ray Building where visitors were once searched by metal detectors for weapons and explosives on arrival.

A forlorn-looking old prison ship is anchored opposite the Museum Shop. It ferried wardens and shackled prisoners to the island and visitors are welcome to explore its interior.

Need I say it's an experience not soon forgotten . . . one that could happen to anyone, anywhere when confronting a strong armed regime whose agenda is threatened.

Travel factfile:

Robben Island tour starts on Cape Town's V and A Waterfront. Ferries leave on the hour 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Standard tour usually three and a half hours long. Fare $12.50 adults, $6.25 ages 2 to 17.

www.robben-island.org.za

E-mail:

info robben-island.org.za

Next week: More of South Africa's travel sights.