Virginia Beach - Norfolk

Our next campground was near Virginia Beach where we learned about flooding caused by wind.  The campground was on a stream, or canal, that flows into the ocean and we had days of strong winds blowing upstream pushing the water into the canals in the campground.  Each day over the course of a week we saw the water level go up a few inches until it overflowed the retaining walls.  To make matters worse, we got dumped on by heavy rain storms moving through.  Finally on Friday the winds switched to the opposite direction which blew the water back out.  The water went down 3 feet in two days.  Crazy stuff.

Three subs

We went on a harbor cruise in Norfolk.  We went down the Elizabeth River out toward Chesapeake Bay and the Naval shipyard.  The Captain, narrator, had an amazing amount of information to share all along the way.  We went right by container ships going in and out of port so we saw how big they are.  The Navy ships were awesome but the description and capabilities is way too much to remember much less repeat here.  We even got lucky and an aircraft carrier came into port a day or two before.  Here are a few pictures.

Amphibious

Carrier

USS Wisconsin

After the harbor cruise we went in the Nauticus Museum.  It was pretty interesting but the part we liked the most was going on the USS Wisconsin battleship (part of the museum price).  The ship saw action in WWII, Korean War, and Gulf War.  For those that remember watching the beginning of the Gulf War on CNN, this ship was the one that shot off the first Tomahawk missiles.  I remember that very clearly so to stand next to the actual launchers was pretty cool.

USS Wisconsin

On board Battleship Wisconsin

Tomahawk missile lauchers