A simple wooden door set in the western wall of Cape Coast Castle, opening onto the rocks and the surf below. This is the gate through which enslaved Africans were marched out of the dungeons and into the waiting longboats for transport to the slave ships anchored offshore. The plaque above reads simply 'Door of No Return.'
The guide's pause here is the emotional climax of any tour. Many African American visitors stop, weep, and sometimes leave personal mementos in the doorway. The view through is of nothing remarkable — fishing canoes, surf, the line of the horizon — which is part of what makes it so powerful: this is exactly what the last view of Africa would have been for some twelve million people.