Battleship Memorial Park

Crazy that today we hoped for no warm front to move through. The weather man said if we stay cool, that will lead to more stable weather patterns. There were some tornadoes yesterday that touched down to the north of us, in Mississippi. There is a flash flood warning for our area until further notice, but again, it seems like we are in a little patch of high ground and safety. It rained A LOT today. Brock had work to do, but made a window in his schedule this afternoon for a visit to Battleship Memorial Park to see the USS Alabama. We got as much school done as we could and timed our lunch so that we'd be finished up right when Brock was available to make the most of that window. The only bummer was that the rain was really pounding right when our window opened up. ;o)

One of us was NOT happy to be going to the ship in the rain and said he just wanted to wait in the car, but we drug him out and made him look. He was really worried about his shoes getting ruined and his Superman raincoat tore when he was trying to get it on. He didn't start off his tour on the right foot, but he was finally able to pull it together and enjoy a little exploration on the huge battleship.

It is set up as a museum now with staged displays in the different departments and you are free to go on a self-guided tour of nearly the whole ship. We actually found it hard to keep our little group all together and at one point got separated into 3 even littler groups. I was alone and when I caught up to Spence and Brock, they had no idea where the other kids were. I started to backtrack and heard a loud clang then crying. Sky had slipped and fallen going down the steep steps and was two levels up from where I was. I hurried up to the sound and found Bryn comforting Sky who had had quite a scare. I think it just knocked the wind out of him, but we are blessed that he didn't get his head or break anything. He actually recovered from this quicker than he did from the getting wet idea.

From the ships decks, we could see quite a lot of displays on the grounds, but we didn't check any of them out up close.

Below deck...

The kids especially liked seeing the brig and the sleeping berths.

They also enjoyed seeing the ship's galley and selection of fruit.
I think that is one thing most of us will gorge on when we are back to a non-nomadic life.

Definitely needed to plan a better perspective for taking a picture. Couldn't
figure out how to get more of the ship in and still be able to see the family.

A replica of the Hunley. Notice the rain has stopped.

We also got to tour this sub, the USS Drum, for a few minutes before we had to get back.

Like a ghost ship, the Alabama, as we were driving away, and the fog was building.

We took Brock back to the trailer so that he could conduct his company meeting and I took three out of four kids to Walmart mostly to give the meeting the gift of quiet, but also to pick up a few items on the shopping list. When we got back to the trailer, we ate dinner and everyone involved themselves in their own quiet pastimes.

Tomorrow we head west from here to a state park in Mississippi.