The Battleship USS Iowa Museum. and our last 2 days here in NB

Sunday, February 23rd

Today was a stay at home day for me. Ray took off to go see the USS Iowa Museum in Long Beach. I will turn the blog over to him.

Okay, how do we work this thing..... oh there's the volume.  Knowing the Queen Mary is in LA I'd planned to see her while here.  Then, while researching other stuff. low and behold here's one of the WWII battleships I read about also open to the public.  Well, to heck with the Queen Mary.  Traffic to the battleship on a Sunday morning at 9 AM is a breeze.... that's why I went on a Sunday at 9 AM.  Entrance for us old geezers is $16.95. If you want to join any of the tours to see the gun turrets, etc. be prepared for another $10 ea.  Not for me though, my back can't handle standing around for the 2 hours one of the tours takes.

First trying to get the bluetooth communicating on my phone with the tour info on the battleship.  Guess my phone is from Mars and the ship from Venus (a ship is referred to as a she isn't it), because they never once talked to each other.   So it's off on the tour following a bunch of arrows.  First up is the bow.

From Google

Each one of the links above are 120 pounds.  The sign says there are 12 shots of chain on each anchor.  I looked, but couldn't figure what kind of shots, but I assume it's rum.

I turned around and there were six verrrry long barrells staring at me.  These things fire a 16" shell a heck of a long ways.  The sign said but I forgot. I did ask the ex-navy volunteer how many Volkswagens the shell weighed but he didn't know.  Here's some pics of the big suckers..

So they stuff a shell and six bags of powder like the picture below in the back end.

Then they pull the trigger, making sure everyone is off the outside deck as the concussion would kill them. It looks like this...

From Google

Oh ya, as you can see there's also a rear turret of the monsters.  Here's a picture.

After going through a labyrinth of hallways you come out at this 5" 38 Caliber Twin Mount guns.  There's a bunch of these scattered on both sides of the superstructure.

Firing control system for the 5" Twin Turrets

Inside the twin mount turret

Next it's off to the bridge.

The round structure to the right is the Armored Conning Tower.  During an engagement, the real important people run into the 17" thick concrete tower and control the ship. 

 As you can see from the pic below, it is very far to the nose.... this thing looks like it would be a bitch to park!

Now down into the bowels of the ship to see the crew quarters, kitchen and mess hall.

Rows of these bunks continue down this hall and the hall behind me and the hall on the other side of the bunks.

Look how many mouths there was to feed!

 The tour arrows now send you back outside to see the more recent additions of protection against missiles coming at you and shooting same at the opponent.

Protection includes gatling guns and chaffe launchers...

On the attack side, the Iowa could launch Tomahawk missiles from box launchers.  These hold four Tomahawks and the whole container, shown below, lifts up off the deck to fire.  These things hit targets 1500 miles away.

Below is one of many Harpoon Missile launcher and one of its business end mounted below it. These things travel up to 75 miles and are designed for anti-ship attacks.

On the rear of the ship is the landing zone for the retriever helicopter and that big ass gun I told you about at the start of the blog....

and a bunch of 6" stern line.  Oh ya, see the bridge in the background in the pic below, there was a police incident and the bridge was closed to all traffic.

The USS Iowa was a big contributor to the Pacific Theatre and was beside the USS Missouri in Tokyo Harbour for the surrender ending WWII.  The ship was pressed into service during the Korean War as well.  Below, you can see the island hopping the ship managed.

The Iowa did sustain one hit during one of the battles.  The pic below doesn't show the damaged area well, but behind the stairs an area is rumpled under the paint.  The shot came from a 3" Japanese emplacement, which the ship's 5" guns destroyed immediately after.

There's lots of other pictures, 81 in total to be exact, but I didn't want to bore our readers too much.  The Iowa is well preserved and is well worth a tour.

Later in the afternoon we had a knock on the door. Girl Guide Cookies for sale. lol

Freya said "did someone say cookies?"

Monday, February 24th

Another lovely day. We decided to go out for breakfast at this well-reviewed little diner, in the Balboa Yacht Basin. Took a walk after breakfast, drooling over the boats. Lots of money here in Newport Beach.

What a beauty!

 Lots of boats anchored in the channel. Because it is so narrow they have to be anchored off the bow and the stern to prevent collisions.

On the way back home you drive by a Ferrari dealer and a Mclaren car Dealer. Ray's head was "a swivelling" as I drove us by. lol Yup, lots of money here.

We enjoyed the afternoon outside and then took one last drive to the Balboa Peninsula.

Walking to the pier we saw this "Red Green Special"! All held together with duct tape! lol This car was like Ray's parents car years ago that he learned to drive with. :)

From the pier we noticed this guy drawing in the sand. Pretty cool.

Definitely a little breezy today.

Oh look ... a mermaid.

There are lots of beach rentals right next to the beach. Pretty expensive though I bet.

Oh look it's 3pm ... time to go for Happy Hour again for some oysters. lol Outside the Flying Fish Oyster Bar was this beauty. An old Fiat 600. Hey Dave, would Cheryl like this car?

And that folks, wraps up this week here at Newport Beach. We have thoroughly enjoyed our "food tour" of seafood. Tomorrow jacks up to go further up the coast.