One of Mexico’s most notorious prisons begins a new chapter this weekend as a Pacific Ocean escape after a makeover aimed at bringing tourists to the former penal colony.
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Friday night opened the Islas Marias Tourist Center, seeking to turn the decades-old federal prison on the Islas Marias archipelago into an environmental attraction and place for history buffs.
“This is tourism for excursions, to explore, to live with nature,” Lopez Obrador said this week. “To recreate history, it’s extraordinary, extraordinary.”
As well as guest cottages, a restaurant, a cafe and beaches, the renovated site includes an arch named after Nelson Mandela, who spent around 18 years behind bars on South Africa’s Robben Island before being elected the country’s president.
Mandela is “an example that even behind prison walls, ideals and change can live on for those who want to change history,” Mexico’s government said in a promotional video.
Exterior view of the new Marias Islands Cultural Centre.
Raquel Cunha/Reuters
Located about 62 miles off the western state of Nayar, Islas Marias became a prison in 1905 under dictator Porfirio Diaz and was in near-constant use until it was closed by Lopez Obrador in 2019.
The facility once housed many political prisoners, including Jose Revueltas, an influential Mexican writer jailed several times for his leftist activism.
The government has announced package tours to the islands, with ferries to the main town of Puerto Balleto starting next week. The center will be run by the Mexican Navy and is part of a protected UNESCO biosphere reserve.
Mexico has enjoyed a post-pandemic tourism boom, with international arrivals to the country up 56.4% during the first 10 months of 2022 compared to the same period last year and 7.3% compared to 2019.
