GITMO BAY

 Auto of the day:

The '56 Ford

Note:  Yes, Chatty we still pay our dues and use our RV membership; Also the noise did effect my hearing.  

Susan, Thousand Trails is the last company to buy our membership. So we are now Thousand Trails members. LOL

Now  GITMO continued:

Gitmo is 40 sq miles. The area has ‘perfect weather’ so it is ideal for ships inspections and shake down cruises, the reason for the base for over 100 years. Folks know it now as the location of an international prison, BUT my friend that is a very small part of the place.

There are several free movie theaters, all outdoors .

This is one of the movie theaters used by Bob Hope and his crew featuring Charlie Pride and Allan Shepherd when he stopped by on his way from Vietnam.

My girl learned to live with lizards in the house and on the ceilings at times. On outings we would enjoy Iguanas.

(This dude was about 3 feet long and begging for a snack)

Life was laid back in GITMO and 30 years behind the states in many ways.

Is this a relaxed Bible study at the rocky beach or what?

At the Family Beach on Gitmo,  Fleet Sailors did not come here.

Once home on leave we bought three moto Cross bikes. I had no idea how I would get them to GITMO. It was a great gamble but I found a Ship headed for Gitmo on a shake down cruise and talked a Supply chief into bringing them down and I would loan him a car during their refresher training. He called for his crane operator and loaded the bikes, It worked like a charm.

The boys enjoyed them and won many trophies in the moto cross races there.

Bowling was big there also, we joined leagues and learned to bowl.

We also had a dog left behind by those shipping out, shipping pets in and out was a problem so they were Cubans and born there then passed from family to family.

One other benefit, GITMO was the shopping place for the Embassy folks in the Caribbean. Naturally the planes flying to the Embassy locations was empty going, so we could actually bum rides to Jamaica, Puerto Rico and Haiti.  If we took the flights we could look around those cities where we landed and be back to the airport when the flight returned the embassy folks to their jobs, Then we flew back to GITMO. We were able to fly to those three locations, during our almost 4 years there.

We contacted a missionary in Port au Prince once and asked if we could bring him anything. He said it would sure be nice to have a ‘ham.’  We bought the biggest one at the commissary and delivered it when we landed in Haiti.

Nite Shipslog

PS: I probably have written all this in the past, please forgive the repeats if I have. I smile at where Myra was raised and recognize a lot of the same feelings of our isolations. However she was at a 'secret location' Gitmo isn't that.