Touring the Ship

When chatting on the island that Sunday the officers agreed that Monica (Dutch), Gina (South African) and I could bring all six of our kids for a tour of the ship later in the week, even though they're all much younger than 10, the minimum age to board. By the time the day arrived everyone was pretty worked up to see the Big American Ship up close!
As I knew there'd be lots of ladder climbing, we got them geared up in sneaks and shorts (although Cecilia would have much preferred a dress for such an outing).

Once aboard everyone was pretty much in awe of all the machinery and metal everywhere. It was just like being in a movie!
A pretty patient sailor named Purley was assigned to give us a tour of the entire ship, explaining as best he could to a pretty rambunctious audience.

I actually think the moms were more interested in the tour than the kids...
Until we got to the bridge which pretty much fascinated us all. Of course I'd love to explain to you how this here equipent works, but then I'd be giving away national security secrets. Sorry.
And then there were the big-gun-torpedo-thingies (I don't think that's the actual technical name) which shoot out thousands of bullets the size of a shoe in 1.2 seconds. As I looked around I figured the gun must be manned by........
the silent look-out guy standing near by.
We did our own looking-out too while on the ship, but we were just trying to see if we could see the African cockroaches from this high up.As we left we realized we were quite privileged to be given such an opportunity to see this type of ship. I just hope the kids are old enough to remember it one day!