Bucket List Item #79 - Go to Pearl Harbor - CHECK

 Pearl Harbor was one of those really cool things to see and do but also extremely sad to walk around and think about what happened there. But that being said I'm pretty proud to say that I'm part of a military family.

 We had to split the doing Pearl Harbor into two different days because we arrived to late to get free tickets to go to the USS Arizona. Pearl Harbor is run by the Parks and Rec Department of Hawaii but the Navy is the one that takes visitors to the USS Arizona and they only do so many trips a day and if you don't get there early enough you won't get tickets. We got there about 8 a.m. the second day and our assigned time to see the Arizona still wasn't until 12:15 p.m. So a word of advice, go early or the tour groups will grab all the ticket and you won't be able to get to the Arizona.

 So the first day we went and did the Mighty Moe or the USS Missouri. It was a pretty awesome battleship. It is so much bigger than you actually image, well at least to me. Most of these pictures are from my phone as I just wanted to get them posted but Tim took some pretty awesome ones with the big camera.

Here is the Arizona from the dock of the Missouri. It was a beautiful day when we went. The sun was out but it wasn't blazing down on us so it wasn't to hot.

Before we went out the the Arizona they make you watch a short film on why Japan bombed us and what happened on December 7th. It was very sad to watch all the footage.

 We were also asked to be as quiet as we could when we were on the Arizona in respect for the fallen men that are still entombed there. When you get out to "the bridge" and look down and still see the sunken ship you just want to cry to think of all those poor men that are down there.

 Another thing that I learned was that if you were a survivor of the Arizona that you have the option to be buried down there with the other fallen sailors. They will have a special ceremony after the memorial is closed and divers will take the urn of the deceased down to the hull of the Arizona and place him inside. I thought it was a nice idea and option.

The Arizona also has a shrine room. The park ranger was telling us that it has all of the names of the fallen Navy sailors and the Marines that were on the ship at the time Pearl Harbor was attacked. Again this was both cool and sad at the same time. RIP and Happy late Memorial Day to all the fallen.