Roots

We spent a day at Annapolis, Maryland - a relaxing and interesting town on the Chesapeake estuary.

I was fascinated to find this Alex Hayley/Kunte Kinte memorial on the harbour front for two reasons;

Firstly I vividly remember watching 'Roots' on British TV as a teenager and later reading the book while at college. A very powerful piece of work is an understatement.

Many years later while in Ghana, I visited the slave forts on that nation's coast - a terrifying insight into the capture and holding of slaves before the middle passage. You could walk through the gate of no return which led to the ships and imagine the fear and horror of the captured (while also being repulsed by the chapel and pious Biblical quotes lodged directly above it)

Today I was at the other end of that journey - and trying to imagine how the slaves felt as they hit land once more in places like Annapolis as Kunte Kinte did.

Really very humbling.. the local Banneker - Douglass museum was friendly and informative on this also.

The boat trip on the Severn River provided lighter relief.

All round a really worthwhile day out on a warm spring day.