Happy Memorial day everyone! One of the highlights of our trip to San Diego back in August 2016, was visiting the USS Midway CV-41 Naval Aircraft Carrier Museum with Mel's dad and Jake's grandpa, Matt. The retired Navy Aircraft Carrier turned museum is located at Navy Pier in downtown San Diego. Before we get into any broader details about this adventure, we would like to take a moment to thank all of those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our country. As President Harry Truman once said "Our debt to the heroic men and valiant women in the service of our country can never be repaid. They have earned our undying gratitude, America will never forget their sacrifices." The men and women of our military deserve to be remembered on this day and every day for their outstanding work and incredible selflessness. Today we celebrate all men and women in the armed services, in our hearts and minds and thank god that people like them exist and existed in this world. If you do see a vet or active duty service member today or really any day, welcome them home and thank them for their service. It means a lot to them. To all you vets, our sincerest gratitude goes to you and your family. Thank you for all you do.
Jake and Grandpa Matt posing for a photo with the behemoth USS Midway in the background. Jake was super pumped to get on board, he seriously loves boats, especially giant ones he can endlessly explore. The Midway is probably one of the best things to do in downtown San Diego. For just $20 a ticket in person or $18 online, kids under 5 are free and children 6-12 are just $10 at the door and $8 online, you can have hours of fun with your family adventuring around this historic giant of our Naval might.
A wide view of Navy Pier in downtown San Diego from the boardwalk. Off in the distance to the left you can see a large 25-foot statue titled "Unconditional Surrender", modeled after the famous photo of a WWII sailor kissing a random nurse in Time Square and to the right is the hull of the Midway. This little area is called Tuna Harbor Park and features a little restaurant on the water called The Fish Market. Additional parking for the ship and Tuna Harbor Park is also located just outside of the photo to the left but there is ample free parking located directly next to the ship.
The San Diego Silverman is an awesomely hard worker who performs on the daily for tourists walking the boardwalk. He puts on a really cool little show and is seriously great with kids. Jake was a little timid when he fist saw him but warmed up to him almost immediately when the Silverman started to interact with him.
Mel's dad Matt gave Silverman a high-five and a little tip for making Jake laugh and doing his thing in the hot sun. Silverman has been at it since 2002.
Walking along the boardwalk towards the entrance of CV-41 provides ample views of the ship, giving you a glimpse of the awesomeness onboard. You can see that a lot of boat traffic comes through the area as well to get a unique view of the ship from the water.
USS Midway's bow as seen from the Flagship Cruises Spirit of San Diego south harbor tour.
The boardwalk is pretty awesome. Its perfect for cruising with a stroller. There are also a couple of places to grab a bite to eat and all sorts of entertaining things going on here. Including Silverman and even a Tom Cruise impersonator acting like he is Maverick from Top Gun.
USS Midway as seen from its stern. Just above the ship's name, is the lovely fantail cafe aboard the ship. The cafe overs a very wide variety of tasty eats ranging from sandwiches to beef and vegetable spring rolls. Check out the menu at www.FantailCafe.com.
The USS Midway served our nation for an incredible 47 years. She was commissioned a week after the end of World War II and features a revolutionary hull design, which gave her better maneuverability than any aircraft carriers previously built, she was also the largest ship, at 968 feet long, in the world until 1955.
Over the Midway's 47 years of service she saw action in the Vietnam war and acted as the flagship in the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert storm in 1991. A year later, she was decommissioned and later turned into the museum which we see here today. She is also the only remaining US aircraft carrier commissioned after WWII that is not an Essex-class carrier.
Upon entering the Midway, the very first place you come upon is the ship's main hangar deck. This area is home to several restored aircraft, a handful of climb-aboard aircraft to see what it was like to be a pilot, flight simulators, multiple bathrooms, a gift shop and the ship's restaurant, Fantail Cafe. The above aircraft is a F4F Wildcat which helped win the battle of the ship's namesake, The Battle of Midway was a historic naval battle won by the US in the Pacific theater during World War II. Under Admirals Chester Nimitz, Frank Jack Fletcher and Raymond A. Spruance, defeated the Japanese at the Midway Atoll inflicting incredible damage on the enemy, from which the Japanese Navy never recovered.
Over the Midway's long tenure, the ship acted as home to some 225,000 sailors who served this country protecting our freedom. At any one time during a tour down range there could have been up to 5,500 sailors. Pictured above are one of the many cramped living quarters for enlisted tucked into the ship. The officers quarters are much more spacious and only house two per-room.
This area housed the head (bathroom), a storage room and what appeared to be a small nurses station. All four of us got some serious odd vibes in here. Jake wouldn't even go near this area. I decided to venture into the darkness, it definitely had a very spooky feel to it. Approximately 210 men perished while serving aboard the Midway during its tenure, so this ship could possibly be haunted.
Adventuring through the ship as a photographer is like exploring a cave where you are constantly finding gold. The Midway offers seemingly endless opportunities for photography. Whether you a beginner, an amateur or a seasoned pro, its a perfect place to play around with your camera for a couple of hours.
This room pictured aboves sole purpose is to house, maintain, retract and deploy the ships two massive anchors. As you can see, lots of space was needed to keep the anchors working smoothly in the salty environment. Each link on the anchor chains weigh an approximate 156 pounds and the length of the chain is 1800 feet.
By far one of Jake's favorite spaces on the ship was the Detection and Tracking area in the radar room. There are tons of buttons, switches, keyboards, screens, boards and tons of awesome lights for the kids to play with. Jake loved pretending to be one of the good guys sitting behind a radar station.
Kids will all love the endless hallways that run the length of the ship. From some of the doorways, the view looked as if you were glimpsing into an infinite abyss of doors, you literally cannot see the end.
One of the most mind-boggling things about the USS Midway is the ridiculous amount of wiring that courses through the ship. I could not find any statistics about how much is piped through the ship but it is obviously miles upon miles of wiring.
The Midway has a total of four engine rooms, which were each independently manned. You can see Jake above and below here playing with the throttle board for engine number three, the only engine room open to tours. Expect to spend a good amount of time in here if you have kids, there is a lot for them to play with. In the photo below, you can see one of the museum docents, he actually worked in this very engine room when he was active duty aboard the Midway.
With all four propellers working at the same time, the engines could put out an unbelievable 212,000 horsepower with a max forward speed of 33 knots and a max reverse speed of 17.5 knots. The midway was actually so fast for a 70,000 ton ship, that if you wanted to, you could water ski off the back.
The ship has approximately 18 decks, thats equivalent to a 20-story building, of which our favorites were the hangar and flight decks. In the hangar there are several different aircraft which you can sit in to get a feel of what it was like to be a pilot taking off from the Midway's deck.
CV-41's Hangar and Flight deck are now home to 29 restored aircraft. The flight deck is really the place to check them all out. If you have a stroller with you like we did, take the elevator up from the hangar deck where you first entered the ship, to the flight deck. And trust us, the flight deck is a massive 4.02 acres, so you will want the stroller for this part of the adventure. The above aircraft is the RA-5C Vigilante. This aircraft is a modified version of the original A-5 which began deployments in June of 1961. Its fame lies in the fact that it was one of the largest and heaviest planes ever accepted for service on US aircraft carriers. The RA-5C differs from the original A-5 because instead of bombs, it holds reconnaissance gear in its bay. Without ordinance on board, the plane could hold four fuel tanks, making it excellent for long range recon missions.
The midway's aircraft inventory ranges all the way from World War II to Operation Desert Storm. You can see above that Jake loved getting to play in this T-2C Buckeye, complete with co-pilot in the navigator's seat and daddy checking out the view from above. The T-2C Buckeye was primarily used as an intermediate training aircraft intended to introduce US Navy and Marine Corps Aviators to jet flight.
Another angle of Jake playing in the Buckeye. You can see the training plane was heavily used and has succumbed to the elements from being open on the flight deck. There was a small line to get into the T-2C, it happens to be the only climb-aboard plane on the flight deck.
This was Jake waiting to climb into the T-2C Buckeye. The gift shop has quite the assortment of books, shirts and candy amongst other unique gifts pertaining to the USS Midway. This lollipop looked pretty awesome, so we hooked the little dude up with something tasty for checking out the flight deck.
Tourists walk by this immaculately restored all-weather attack A-6 Intruder, which saw active duty from the Vietnam War all the way until 1997 when it was retired from service from the Navy. Because the plane's wings were able to fold, it allowed the Navy to maximize its space in its hangars and flight decks aboard aircraft carriers.
These four helicopters :HO3S Dragonfly (far left), Piasecki H24 Retriever Twin Rotor , HSS-1 Seabat, SH-2F Seasprite (far right), make up a significant display towards the bow of the ship on the flight deck. You can't go in them but getting to see the evolution of troop transports and rescue helicopters before your eyes is a rare experience.
Who doesn't like a Seahawk? its probably one of the coolest looking helicopters out there. Jake saw the H-60 and ran right for it. The Seahawk is an all-purpose helicopter capable in all sorts of diverse environments from Alaska to the middle east. It is used to this day for all sorts of combat and rescue missions.
Mel and I were able to sneak away for a minute (because Jake was playing in the Seahawk with grandpa) to snap this quick selfie with our Nikon D750. In the background you can see the beautiful island of Coronado.
For some reason Jake thought all the fake mannequins standing around and in the aircraft were awesome. He really liked this pilot in full flight suit, I mean lets admit, flight suits are pretty cool looking though.
Another view from the Midway's flight deck looking out over the parking lot of Tuna Harbor Park out to San Diego harbor and Coronado.
This view is of the flight deck taken from the bridge looking towards the stern out to downtown San Diego. Most of the aircraft on the flight deck are located in this general area, towards the bow are only a handful more helicopters and couple planes.
Our standard family photo with Jake making an awesome pose as always, awesome lollipop in hand. This was before I tried to eat his lollipop.
This is our family photo with me trying to eat Jake's lollipop. He felt like sharing this day.
Jake and grandpa Matt walking over to a Sea Knight to check out what its like inside. The Sea Knight was fully open to the public, so you can climb-in and get the feel of what it was like to fly a mission in this helicopter.
Navy Security Forces and what looks like Navy Seals in the RHIB perhaps?
View looking out to the bow of the USS Midway from the captain's chair. The tour of the ship's bridge is a different affair unto itself. You have to wait on a line since there is a limited number of people that can be up in the bridge at any one time due to the small spaces. This section of the tour is also the only part where a docent will guide you through. This section takes about 20 minutes to go through. Its important to note that children are not allowed in this portion of the ship, so just keep that in mind if you have children with you under 12. Jake had to stay on the flight deck with grandpa Matt while we went up.
The USS Midway is not just a museum, its an excellent affordable fun family adventure experience located in Downtown San Diego. To our family, it was probably the most fun we had the entire time we were in San Diego.
For more information and to purchase your tickets visit www.Midway.org.
