The decks of the USS Missouri are made of teak wood.
Following our harrowing day of bus rides in Honolulu, we set out early to spend the entire day at the Pearl Harbor Historic Sites. A recent renovation makes it super easy to maneuver all four of the sites. Two of the featured sites—the USS Missouri and the Pacific Aviation Museum—are actually located on Ford Island, an active military base in the middle of Pearl Harbor. We pick up our tickets and head for the free shuttle bus that will take us there.
First stop: the USS Missouri. This was the site that Carson really wanted to see during his visit and it didn’t disappoint.
Our tour guide walked us around the deck of the ship, pointing out various details and sharing factoids about the ship itself and the history of the USS Missouri. While the ship sits in Pearl Harbor today, the USS Missouri wasn’t actually there on the “day of infamy”—she was still in production in New York. The Missouri, an Iowa class battleship, joined World War II in the final months and participated in several critical battles, including the Allied invasion of Iwo Jima. (In later years, Missouri participated in the Korean War and Operation Desert Storm.)
[To read the rest of Kris Bordessa’s time at the USS Missouri, visit GeekMom!]
