I spent four years in the U.S. Navy. I went twice to Vietnam for extended stays of nine months each. When not in combat I was given a tour of the world from Vladivostok, Soviet Union to Tasmania in the Antarctic Ocean. We got there via the Indian Ocean from the Pacific Ocean. It took months and were the most memorable of my life.
I loved being at sea no matter how rough it got and it got rough. We were running around the edge of a Typhoon that was giving us 26 foot swells with a few even larger. It was one of those times we walked through the passageways by putting one foot on the wall while the other was on the deck. Rough much?
I give you this little walk back in time as traveling on the oceans gives one a mental picture of the size of our planet. It is a wonder to behold out at sea with no land within a thousand miles. We passed few ships as we did not travel on ocean paths like the rest. Instead, we traveled paths not frequented so as to keep our ships movements secret. I suppose nuclear warheads on board was a huge part of this secrecy.
All in all, it has been a wonder to have lived through two tours of combat, traveled so very far via the sea and gotten to see lands and islands that few are able to. Borneo for one. Living aboard a ship means that a ships crew needs to always be on their toes and never take one second for granted. The oceans would just as soon sink you as allow you to travel. A once in a lifetime experience that made the rest of my experiences pail in comparison, but for the birth of our children.
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