Southern California – 2019 8 – USS Midway

[Libby]

I’ve been an absolute failure with this trip report and nearly 2 years on I can’t find my trip notes. So … I’m going to continue with some photos and things I remember. Sorry the next entries will be very brief, but I hope you enjoy the photos.

Southern California – 2019 8 – USS Midway
Wednesday August 14th 2019

Today we made the short walk to the USS Midway museum which is moored close to our hotel.

On the way we saw the famous “Unconditional Surrender” statue, which was huge.

Nearby were a set of sculptures commemorating Bob Hope entertaining the troops.

We then made our way onto the Midway.

This aircraft carrier came into service in 1945 after the war ended but has seen action in Vietnam and the Gulf war amongst other conflicts. It was decommissioned in 1992 and kept in storage before becoming a museum in the early 2000s.

We thought we’d spend just an hour or two there but when we left 3 hours later there were still things to see. The audio guide was very detailed.
We saw planes and other aircraft, the living and working areas, and there was also a snack bar and shop that were absolutely lost in the cavernous hanger deck. (And a pigeon nesting in one of the planes.)

We also enjoyed the views from the flight deck and spotted our hotel and the statues we’d seen earlier.

It is overwhelming to imagine the service personnel who lived and worked here for months on end and I have a huge respect for them.

After this we grabbed another Earl of Sandwich (keeping our voices quiet this time so our accent wasn’t spotted!)

Now I wanted to send about a dozen postcards home. In the past we’ve been able to get stamps in the hotel lobby (we were even gifted some in Hyannis) but our hotel had none and directed us across the road to a sister establishment. Here they only had souvenir stamps at double the normal price. As we were planning to explore San Diego itself this afternoon we decided to walk to the Post Office. (And quite a walk it was!) But we found it and got our cards posted.

We then walked to the Santa Fe railway station where I thought we could catch a bus to the zoo in the morning. (In the end we decided to drive but the station was beautiful.)

We came home along the shoreline and saw the old sailing boats moored up there.

I don’t remember where we ate but we spent the evening at Seaport Village.