We had left off in Key West during my Navy years....  { BTW for those ladies who wanted to know; the Navy issued us white boxers as standard issue undies... but we called them skivies...} A lot of stuff went down in those years, though at the time I did not realize it....  We were sent to Gitmo Cuba, for training after spending those wonderful cold months in the state of RI...  For those of you that do not know Gitmo is the east coast training base for shipboard readness...  Kind of a boot camp for ships....   We got to play games, and spend many hours running around... 

This was the first time I got to hear live firing of the 5 inch guns...  I was in the forward Ammo Handling room which is directly below the Gun mount....   Here is where I learned to sleep on the cold hard deck.... We would be at GQ for hours, waiting our turn to go on the firing line... Then they would call down "Stand by for action" which meant get ready to pass 5 inch shells over to the elevators which took them up to the guns...   FUN for all...

We did have a all out speed run with another can: and we won...  Received the following message, " Well done Robert E.Lee.."   {For those of you who don't read history, that refers to a great steamboat race on the Mississippi, between the Robert E. Lee and the Natchez.. The lee won...}  By the way we had a Confederate Naval Ensign painted on the rear 5 Inch gun mount, which I helped paint...  We were called the" rebel can...."

We went over to Ochoa Rios, Jamaica for Christmas; missed Bob Hope at Gitmo...  If you saw the James Bond movie "Dr. No" , we were tied up to the same pier, which is where they shot the movie...  Later on back in Key West we were extras in the JFK " PT 109' movie made there.... Famous places... 

 Jamaica was where I had some first time experiences: first time I saw someone offer sexua| intercourse for food, very sad in deed... And for the first time; I got to drive on the wrong side of the road....  The country side was beautiful,  went diving in the clearest water I had ever seen up to that time.....   When we first came we anchored out for a few hours, and could see the anchor and chain down on the bottom over a hundred feet... After Gitmo went back to Key West and  Sonar School Training.... More on that we had some real unique experiences later... {You can ask about Gitmo, also... great diving there too....

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