Pool Reports: Obamas Tour Former Slave Fortress in Ghana

Pool report #5
Cape Coast, Ghana
July 11, 2009

Marine One took off about 2 p.m. and landed in Cape Coast about 40 minutes later. One of the staff choppers sank in the muddy field and had to take off again to try to get a better landing. Must have been rough since Marvin Nicholson emerged from the chopper holding a white cloth against his head as if hurt.

Motorcade through town to castle was a much more electric scene than in Accra. Thousands and thousands of people lined the route, the so-called sea of humanity filling every empty space, many wearing Obama T-shirts, some on rooftops, leaning out of windows, literally hanging from scaffolding, most waving, cheering, shouting. At one point, several hundred people started running down the road chasing the motorcade until stopped by security.

Motorcade passed shantytowns with laundry hanging on lines, ramshackle buildings without glass in the windows, shipping container shops. The castle, right on the sea, is white with blue window shutters and red tile roofs.

Potus is now in blue polo-style shirt and khaki pants, accompanied by Michelle, the girls and Marian Robinson, all also in casual clothes. Your pool saw them emerge from the building and unveil a plaque marking the visit mounted on the wall outside male slave dungeons: "This plaque was unveiled by President Barack Obama and the First Lady Michelle Obama of the United States of America on the occasion of their visit to the Cape Coast Castle on the 11th day of July 2009."

Potus and the others were listening to a guide and ocassionally smiled or laughed but were too far away to hear. The guides then brought them up to the wall overlooking the sea, with old cannons pointed outward. Potus held Sasha's hand while Flotus held Malia's. Potus was asking where things happened but still too far to pick up with precision.

Your pool was then taken out the Door of No Return past the dungeons to wait for the Potus family. The dungeons were dank, cramped stone rooms with no natural light, no furniture, nothing of any sort. The two blue wooden doors are about 10 feet tall with a stone arch overhead. Above the door on the inside were two signs, both saying "Door of No Return," one wooden and the other more modern. Above the door on the other side is a sign saying "Door of Return," put up in modern times as an affirmation of Africa rejecting slavery and welcoming its people home.

Potus then came over to make brief remarks that we're told were piped into the filing center back there in Accra. Potus now in the castle doing interviews with Sky TV and with Anderson Cooper of CNN.

Pool report #6
Accra, Ghana
July 11, 2009

As Potus left the castle, he stopped to wave for a few minutes at the
vast crowd gathered to witness the scene. Unlike President Clinton, who
waded into such a crowd 11 years ago, Potus kept a discreet distance,
clearly cognizant that walking right up to the people could easily spark
a stampede in which someone could be hurt. Motorcade left for the few
minute drive to the landing zone.

Potus and the helicopters took off about 5:15. Update: Marvin Nicholson
looks fine. We're told he hit his head while boarding the chopper in
Accra, not during the rocky landing, takeoff and landing in Cape Coast.
Potus landed back at airport about 5:50 p.m. and in a change of plans
headed back to hotel, presumably to change for the departure ceremony.