Posted on 06/08/2002 3:02:38 PM PDT by TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
There was another outdoor movie place down past NAV lodge mostly fleeters went to. There was also a small bar not open when I was there that is (was) famous to the left of NAVEXCHANGE on same side of rd.
WATCONDITION CHARLIE LOL!!!!!! When I was there there were set strict hrs. of watering lawns.
Oh and do you know what hydroids and the hot tub are? LOL!!!Were the NAVDIVERS/SEAL there at SIMA at R-7?
Could you rent boats at MWR while there? Was too cool. There was a point going down a canal that looked like Vietnam with alligators sharks in it that there was a sign that if you floated past a nano second you were shot at taken by NEGate castros. Many divers also ventured and were greeted by gun boats.
Now that terrorists are at McCalla now. It is probably not so family friendly. I wish I were a fly on the wall right now up a wee hill at the dentists to (view) the a-hole terrorists at camp X ray.
I was there when Castro cut the water pipe. We were limited to a gallon of water per day (family of 4) for months. Everyone took their families to the beach for bathing.
Oh and do you know what hydroids and the hot tub are?
I was either too young to be in on that, or it didn't exist back then.
The Seals were there in the 60's. There were rumors that they would slip over the fence into Guantanamo City for R&R. Don't know if that was true or not.
I got together with my brother the other day, and we were reminiscing about the 'good old days' when we were growing up in Gitmo. I wish my boys could experience some of the carefree atmosphere we had there. It was a closed community and we, as boys, could roam pretty free. As long as we avoided the fenceline area, the barracudas, the mine fields and the occasional scorpion we were safe and sound. Things were pretty tense when we returned to base after the missile crisis (I found a campsite for some spies right about then), but that was fairly short lived.
TV was pathetic. WGBY radio was ok for a young teenager.
The schools have changed a lot based on the links you supplied. We went to school in stand-alone wooden buildings. They resembled cabanas.
Now I'm homesick again.
We got hit by the same hurricane three times. It hit the island, and they let us out of our homes/shelters. That afternoon they locked us down again, because it had turned around. This happened three times. It tore up the base a lot and killed a lot of people over in Guantanamo City.
The most memorable things about living there were the Cubans who came onto the base to work. Their lives were made miserable by Castro. One Christmas we gave some small toys to a Cuban lady to give to her kids. They probably cost a dollar. The guards strip-searched her and found them. They beat her black and blue and kept her in prison over the holidays.
Rumors at my time were bro Raul is bad a$$ and castro dying of cancer. Been 10 yrs he still alive...
Gitmo is Nav's best kept secret.
Paul, "I have AT&T cable and Zone Alarm was causing me quite a bit of trouble with Windows."
I also have ATT cable internet. I networked the home using a Linksys router. I use Zone Alarm Pro and Trend Micro PC-cillin. Works GREAT! No problems connecting, automatic alerts when updates are available, and everything "plays nice". According to my logs, the 3 days I had it installed and used the dialup, I had 209 hits on the firewall. After the transition to the network/cable connection, 0 alerts in a week of using it.
I second Texas_Jarhead's advice. Zone Alarm Pro and PC-cillin is the way to go.
No there wasn't anything like McDonalds or pizza when we were there. When we returned to Norfolk the McD's craze was in full force and we were amazed people spent money on that stuff! Then my parents left my brother and myself at the motel so they could have a night out at a real restaurant. We watched The Adam's Family on TV (our first American TV in 8-9 years). That was culture shock.
The banana rats would crawl up in everyones car engines and chew away at wires (at night they noctural) and MANY would be out at O dark thirty for duty revving to try to start their cars....so base security would quietly say to get a pan of anti-freeze to put under cars so banan rats would drink to avert the ruining cars starting probs.
We had lots of banana rats around, but I never heard of them damaging cars. I remember some MPs ran over a python one night. They stopped their jeep ON the snake. It lifted them up and slithered off. They wouldn't get out to follow the critter, though.
Deer Park was next to Hoey Village (our housing area). I noticed on the links you showed that the housing areas now have AC. Nobody had air conditioning when we were there.
We were evacuated for the missile crisis on an old destroyer that was loaded down with ammunition that was to be dumped at sea. Our ship was so overloaded it couldn't keep up with the fleet. We were tracked the entire trip by a Russian submarine. We would all get on deck and wave at the Russians. The ship was triple-booked. You could use a bunk for 6 hours, then had to give it up for someone else. There were 4 shifts in a day. The sailors slept on the decks. We arrived in Norfolk at the end of October wearing shorts and T-shirts (that was all we owned). The Salvation Army opened up warehouses full of clothes, bedding, and kitchen supplies. They pushed us to take as much as we could use. I always remember that when I pass the bell-ringers at Christmas time. I've tried to teach my boys to always put something in their kettles.
Right before we left the port in Gitmo, a ship came in and began unloading hundreds of coffins. We were genuinely anticipating a war. Some marines had stormed the beaches the day before, and were met my dependants enjoying the sunshine. They had been informed that GITMO had fallen to the Russians, and they would be fighting their way from the beaches all the way to Havana. They were expecting 90% casualties. It's a wonder they didn't shoot some Americans as they landed.
I was there during Bay of Pigs, but don't remember anyone being evacuated. There was one lady who somehow missed the dependent evacuation for the missile crisis. She was picked up by a chopper.
We partied in cabanas at the beach, too. Loved them.
Goodbye for now.....................
I will second that opinion wholeheartedly.
That combination works great for me and can't be beat.
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