My Submarine Tour and Kim's Going-Away Party

Thurs. Feb 16 - I met with the MWR Director, James Baker, this morning at 8:30 am to head to NAS II to attend a monthly Advisory meeting that I need to attend for my MWR Program. The meeting lasted about 45 minutes and had representatives from MWR, the Navy Exchange, the Commisary, and Safety. Most of the questions were geared to the NEX/Commisary but James was asked a few questions concerning the skatepark. After the meeting was over, we headed back to the Administration Building to head out to Augusta Bay for our Submarine tour. We got one of our 8 passenger vans to use for the trip and all the big dogs and me piled in and were on our way. It was the MWR Director, some of the big-time managers that I hang out with all the time, and little ole' me. They are the coolest group of people to hang out with, they are hilarious and love making fun of each other. We got down to Augusta around 11am and walked onto the pier where the gigantic USS Emory S. Land was anchored. The Land is a tendor ship for subs that just floats around in the Mediterranean when it's not docked in La Maddalena. We had to walk through that and down a giant 40 ft ladder to get onto the submarine (USS Toledo). The USS Toledo is a nuclear powered attack submarine. The sub looked to tiny compared to this ship, but only 1/3 was out of the water. It is 360 ft long, 30 ft in diameter, and has a 20ft sail. As soon as I got on it, 3 guys from my tour yesterday shouted out my name and started talking to me. It was pretty cool cuz it was right in front of my bosses. They were like "damn miss popular." It was funny, the guys kept talking to me and one of them gave me a cool photo of the sub in a nice Navy folder. They broke us up into 2 groups to fit through the sub and be able to hear the guide. Amber and I were in one of the groups so of course being women we got the full-details, secret rooms, too-much information tour. No women are allowed on any sub in the US due to difficulties with birthing and grooming reasons. It was so cool. This guy, Minter, gave us like a 2-hour tour of this tiny ship. We weren't suppose to go in a bunch of rooms, but since he had the ladies we got a little further than we were really suppose to. We got in the torpedo birthing room which holds 19 out of the 36 torpedos on the ship. The sub is from Connecticut so they have only been at sea for about a month. Its crazy but these guys look like ghosts since they never see the sun. He brought us into the captains quarters, sonar room, torpedo rooms, birthings, dining hall, control room like in the movies, and the computer room. It was really amazing to actually see how these guys live. I don't know how they do it. Theres 165 shipmmates on this sub which is only made to fit 110. You can't even walk straight down the halls, you have to turn constantly. If you were over 6' you had to duck the whole time. It's insane what they have to sleep in. They share beds (take shifts) which are so small that you can't sit up in them. It's almost sad that they aren't allowed better conditions. Everyone was really nice though and didn't mind us touring the ship. We got to tour all three levels and the upper deck. You can walk all along the top deck, I'm so glad they let me come on this tour with them. They leave port tomorrow. Italians don't ever know when nuclear subs come in luckily, they are too hidden in our port. I've heard that carriers start a hissy-fit around here. You can supposedly see them from over 5 miles away in the ocean. I wonder if we'll have one of those come in while I'm here. We never know about ships arriving until a day or a few minutes in advance since they're not allowed to reveil their port until they get there. It's all really cool to learn about. After we got back we all went and ate lunch and needed to get to work. I went into ITT, got some boards ready and worked on my blog. Leslie came me the final count for Calabria, 20. I'm really excited, I need to switch out my boots for the more comfortable ones tomorrow before we leave. I booked some day tours while I was up front at the counter and Leslie started talking to me about a job with MWR. She was asking me about college and what my plans were when I finish this internship. She was wondering if I would work over here for a few years if I could get hired. James told me the other day that its really hard for new people to get an overseas job at first. He basically said it would be impossible for me since I have no experience with them. Leslie said thats a bunch of crap and with my degree actually in recreation and tourism that she thinks I could. We talked for awhile and she's really got me convinced to try for Kim's position or something close to it. There's a lot more details I need to find out, but if I could start when I'm finished, I might as well try for it to be in it for the long haul. There's a lot of money and benefits to working in this program. I'll check it out more next week when I get back from my trip. I walked over to the main office to pick up the plaque they had made for Kim. It was really cool. Leslie asked me to go to the NEX and buy some wrapping paper and a small bouquet of flowers for her party tonight since she had to get home and change. I had a 5X7 picture printed out for her that I needed to get a frame for of a few of us snowboarding last weekend when her husband got in town. She always says they never have any pictures of them together. I left work and did all that. Wrapped her presents and got her a card saying Thanks for everything she's helped me with. Amber picked me up and brought me to the restaurant. About 12 people showed up and it was a lot of fun. We had wine and 3 courses. The Director took my credit card away and told me that I wasn't allowed to pay for my dinner. That was cool, two nights in a row of other people buying me dinner, I'll take it. They couldn't stop thanking me for yesterday and Leslie and Kim were bothering James and James all night about hiring me on. Today and yesterday were absolute awesome days. I got a ride home from Justin and threw in some last minute laundry so I could pack in the morning before work. I talked to Jeff for a little bit about the idea of working over here. We'll talk more about it later when I get some more details. I leave tomorrow at 4pm for Calabria. It's about a 4 hour drive, I'm so excited!!!!