Tora, Tora, Tora!

So today we were out of the house at 9 am to go to Pearl Harbor. We arrived at 10 am and were nearly the last car in the parking lot. Got tickets for 12:40 tour. Waited around, got snacks, talked to some folks from Colorado, and then we watched the movie and took the boat to the memorial. Beautiful as always, and the boys were very interested in every aspect of what happened to start the war and why the Japanese are now our friends and make Prius cars.

After the Arizona Memorial, we went to the USS Missouri, you are herded in large tour buses across the Admiral Cleary bridge to Ford Island where the Missouri is anchored a short distance from the Arizona Memorial. Ford Island looks completely different than when we lived here...the new bridge for one, the golf course actually looks taken care of (instead of the honor system and little wooden box you were expected to put your $1 in), there is new base housing for enlisted folks that looks nicer than our house in MD, a new officers quarters building, the Missouri, and the new Pacific Aviation Museum.

We had a great tour of the Missouri, I have been on it twice now and things have changed since it was used in the Gulf War. The fact they were actually using such a historic ship in combat and risking that it could be destroyed boggles my mind. I am so glad they set up the tour and brought it to Hawaii. It is a nice beginning and end to the story in one location.

The Aviation Museum was a pleasant surprise and the story goes that the hangar that houses Phase 1 of the Museum is about 60 feet from the location of the first bomb dropped on 12/7/1941. Inside the museum they tell the story of before the war and how the war began. They have all sorts of aircraft exhibits. They have also recently acquired the F-15 used in the movie Top Gun, but it was not yet on display. Their plans are to use several other hangars for Phases 2, 3, and 4 which will cover the later years of the war, the Korean war, and Vietnam. At the end of those projects, they are then going to restore the air traffic tower for the Ford Island airstrip. It is one of the last photos on the Picasa site and the white portion of the building was in use on 12/7/1941. The tall red and white tower was built after and used in the movie Pearl Harbor (I have to watch this again now). They now use the red/white tower for training submariners on how to safely ascend out of a sinking sub.

Another treat today was to see the Bonhomme Richard in port http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Bonhomme_Richard_(LHD-6)

They are in town for RIMPAC and they were practicing maneuvers with the hovercraft all day (forgive me for all the pics of the hovercraft, I am fascinated by the thing and the noise it makes on the water). It was parked across from the Arizona Memorial.

The boys had a long but fabulous day, we caught the last shuttle off Ford Island at 5:05 pm. We managed to find our favorite steak house (used to be Black Angus, now Cattle something) for dinner, talked to mom & dad, and then headed to KMart to pick up a few things we forgot and some new snorkle gear for the boys. We are considering going to Haunama Bay tomorrow but I think we may try to go later in the afternoon instead of first thing in the am (parking permitting).

See the new photos on the Picasa site.