Battleship Cove, Massachusetts - September 1st, 2021
Planning around the weather is one of the necessities of camper van life. The forecast for Wednesday was mostly rain all day. A perfect day to explore inside the ships at Battleship Cove.
The remnants of Hurricane Ida were forecasted to come through our area in the evening and overnight. We were moving locations from Wawaloam Campground in Richmond, Rhode Island to Nickerson State Park on Cape Cod in Massachusetts. Along the way, we stopped to visit Battleship Cove in Fall River, Massachusetts on the banks of the Taunton River, where it empties into Mt. Hope Bay. Admission into Battleship Cove is $25 per person, but the ticket is good for two days and will also get you into the nearby Maritime Museum.
The main attractions at Battleship Cove are the four ships you can tour, the USS Massachusetts, the USS Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., the USS Lionfish, and the Hiddensee.
The largest ship is the USS Massachusetts, known as the Big Mamie, which first went into battle during World War II. The 680 foot long vessel could house a crew of up to 2500 people.
The USS Joseph P. Kennedy Jr is a destroyer that was built at the end of WWII, but didn’t see action until the Korean War. It was named to honor Joseph P. Kennedy Jr, who lost his life during a mission in 1944 while serving as a Navy pilot.
The USS Lionfish is a submarine that was first commissioned in 1945 during WWII.
The Hiddensee was built by the Russians for the East German People’s Navy. After the reunification of Germany, it served with the Federal German Navy. In 1991 the Hiddensee was transferred to the U.S. Navy.
We spent most of our time on the huge USS Massachusetts. The ship was like a small village inside. We spent almost an hour wandering around the multiple decks and getting lost. Thank goodness there are markings indicating the fire exit so you can find your way back out. Many rooms are set up with various exhibits such as the Model Aircraft Exhibit and the Women Veterans Exhibit. However, most of the rooms are furnished as appropriate for their original use. Many of the rooms were what we expected, such as bunk rooms, bathrooms, kitchens, engine and radio rooms. However, several of the rooms took us by surprise, such as the tailor, dentist, operating room, and the Gedunk, what they called the soda fountain. The Gedunk made over 100 gallons of ice cream every day for the crew. If someone was interested in looking at all of the displays, we could easily see why they might want to spend two days there.
After the USS Massachusetts, we were starting to reach our saturation point, so we just toured the USS Lionfish and skipped the other two ships. In comparison, the Lionfish was much faster to tour. The top shell is rusting away, so Right Buddy (RB) was a little hesitant about going below. You go down steps at the front of the submarine and come out steps at the back, with a straight walk from one to the other inside. RB found the doorways between each compartment to be a rather tight squeeze. You have to lift your feet pretty high to get them over the door threshold. It was even an effort for RB with her long legs.
Now it was time to get prepared for the storm. When we left the campground that morning, we made sure our fresh tanks were both full and our gray tanks were both empty. We had plugged into shore power over night the night before to make sure our battery bank was fully charged. We also charged all of our devices: our laptops, our phones, our emergency radio, and our Garmin InReach Mini. We would have no hookups at Nickerson State Park. We stopped in Fall River to get gas and go grocery shopping. We felt pretty prepared with plenty of power, water, and food to get us through whatever the storm brought us.
When we arrived at Nickerson to check in to our campsite, we asked the staff about what the possibilities were for flooding. The staff was nice and switched our campsite to higher ground, right next to the restroom. That sounded good to us. It will make it easier to make a bathroom run in the heavy rain.
Keeping up with the weather forecasts, especially when stormy weather is approaching, helps us stay prepared. We did our research and felt we were prepared and safe to wait out storm Ida on Cape Cod. Bring it on!
Check out our related video: Battleship Cove, Massachusetts
(RB)