North America Winter Tour 2023 Day 1: Rest day
Welcome
Yesterday we had a day in Portland to rest and recuperate.
After accumulating a combined total hours of sleep that crept into the mid thirties we dragged ourselves out of bed and assembled in the lobby. Before we could do anything else we needed to eat so we went to the closest place we could see, the St. Honoré Boulangerie. I had a Provence Panini with fresh mozzarella, sliced tomatoes, basil, niçoise olives, roasted garlic, olive oil, and balsamic drizzle.
Next we headed to T-Mobile to get sim cards. It took over an hour for this process to complete so while the staff were trying to find a weakness in the T-Mobile firewall and insert a $5 roaming package into our plans we tried out all the different phones.
With our phones filled up with fresh data and minutes we piled into a cab and headed across the river to OMSI, Portland’s science and industry museum. Permanently affixed to the dock outside this riverside museum is the USS Blueback, a Barbel-class diesel-electric attack submarine that served in the US Navy from 1959-1990. It now serves as a museum ship and we were lucky enough to go on a guided tour led by Bill, a former US Navy sonar operator. I’ll try and recount the facts about this boat, as Bill told them to us.
The Galley: Four chefs were aboard during a cruise, and one of these was a baker responsible for all the bread, pies, and pastries. These chefs were apparently very highly trained and the food aboard US Navy submarines is said to be the best in the military. They carried 14 tons of provisions for the 85 crew members which was enough for a 60 day cruise with a 30 day reserve. The food was mostly packed in tin cans which would fill every storage space in the sub including inside the benches, inside the showers, and along the floor of the walkways creating a layer which they would gradually eat their way through.
The control room featured the two sets of airplane-style controls for driving the submarine. One for controlling the pitch and yaw, the other for controlling the roll. This room also had a few plotting tables for navigation and combat, two periscopes, and plenty of gauges and lights to monitor every aspect of the ship’s status.
The engine control room is where the engineers can monitor and control the boat’s three diesel engines and 504 battery cells. The batteries provide silent propulsion below the surface but have to be recharged by the diesels after a period. For this to happen the submarine must come close to the surface and extend a snorkel to intake air and expel exhaust. These engines created an incredible 137dB of noise! The doors to the engine compartment were closed and even then the engineers had to wear earmuffs to avoid permanent hearing loss.
Torpedo room: the Blueback carried 18 torpedoes which could be fired from the six bow torpedo tubes. To keep all the explosives safe the room was kept very cool and for this reason it was also a useful spot to store some of the more perishable food items that couldn’t fit in the chiller.
Crew quarters: Only the Captain had his own quarters. The crew would sleep in these narrow bunks which very closely resemble the bunks we are about to nestle into for the next five weeks aboard our tour bus. Luckily we don’t have to ‘hot bunk’ though, which is where the newest crew members would take turns in the same bunk as they alternated shifts, usually climbing into a bed that was still warm.
After the tour Liz and Tristan headed to South Hawthorne street to do some thrifting while Jon and I headed into the OMSI museum proper.
Although the museum did seem to have somewhat of a child focus we tried our hardest at all the activities.
We made a boat that could sail across the wind.
We shot a bottle rocket way higher than any of the kids.
We protected the blue man from all the waves.
We made a very cool drawing in the Harmonograph. Please don’t watch this unless you want to be sick.
We also got to see quite a few dinosaur bones and a cool demonstration of liquid nitrogen involving freezing and smashing a racquet ball.
In the evening we all met our manager Jake for dinner, and also Mia, who is coming along to do merch for this tour. It was a fun and almost restful day that involved learning, buying, and friendship.
I would like to apologise to Gabe and add a correction to the boints table. I forgot to add to the chart Gabe’s 450 points earned on the Melbourne Laneway. The numbers are now accurate as of today.
