We planned on visiting Cape Canaveral for a week. When we arrived, there was so much to do, we extended our stay for an additional week. Finally, we found they were going to have another rocket launch, so we extended for another two days. Our campground was just steps from the beach on the back side and faced the coastal ships harbors on the other. This provided us with views of the outgoing ships, casino cruises, cruise ships and even several arriving and departing submarines. Finally, we were able to watch two rocket launches from our site!
Cape Canaveral contains a ship port, Port Canaveral, which is home to several large cruise lines serving the Bahamas and the Caribbean. The Port has two large turning basins for the large ships and is also home to the Trident Submarine base of the US Navy.
Approaching Port Canaveral, we could see several large cruise ships waiting for departure.
Jetty Park and Campground is owned and run by the Cape Canaveral Port Authority. It is on a point surrounded on two sides by water, the ships turning basins and the Atlantic Ocean. Full hookups, laundry facilities, large sites and a separate section for tent campers. There is also a camp store, restaurant and lifeguard facility. The sites are large, staff is friendly and the campground is immaculate.
One of the ships that depart twice daily is the 321' Victory. This unique ship is outfitted as a gambling venue. For $25/ea. you can enjoy a 5 hour cruise, dinner, site seeing and even gamble a bit. It has the latest in slot machines and features most all table games. Dinner was enjoyable, I brought a book to read and I even won some money on the slots.
As we left the port, I snapped this photo of the Florida shoreline and Cocoa Beach.
Since gambling is not permitted in the State of Florida, the Victory cruises outside the State limits into International waters. All gambling is shut down until the ship reaches this area. When the ship heads back to port, all gambling ceases and we all enjoyed the time topside on the decks. They also provided a fantastic duo that played a variety of songs and instrumentals.
We enjoyed the warm sunshine as we arrived back into port. All in all it was a very relaxing day. It was nice that they provided you with lots of other things to do besides gambling. I would recommend this cruise to anyone visiting this area even if you don't gamble.
Here's another picture of the Victory coming back into port. Obviously this was taken a few days after our trip. This picture and the ones below were taken from our site at Jetty Park.
Carnival Lines, Princess and Disney are three of the predominant cruise lines that sail out of Port Canaveral. Looking at the picture of Mickey on the smokestack gives this away as a Disney Cruise.
Debi, sitting in our campsite watching one of the Carnival Cruise ships sail past. It was really interesting seeing the ships come in after dark with all the lights on.
Ever wonder how those BMWs, Mercedes and other vehicles get to the U.S.? This is the Car Carrier, Morning Charlotte. It was built in 2007, is 650 feet long, 104 feet wide and has a carrying tonnage of 60876 tons. Now that's a big boat!
Our third day in the campground, we knew something was going on. The Port Canaveral Police showed a presence, deploying several police cars adjacent to the harbor. There were three Coast Guard boats with manned machine guns as well as several US Navy runners also equipped with manned machine guns. We discovered it was time for the nuclear submarine to head out to sea.
We weren't sure why all the fuss, but we found out later that this was an Ohio Class Nuclear Sub SSBN. Each SSBN submarine is armed with up to 24 Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missiles. The cruise missile submarines carry up to 154 Tomahawk missiles with either conventional or nuclear warheads. This was one mean submarine.
Their port is based at Port Canaveral.
Mother Nature provided quite a show while we were there. This picture doesn't do this rainbow justice. I had to take a video of it in all it's majesty. This was a complete arch, which is a rarity, but then it became a twin rainbow and both were complete arches. It was unfortunate I didn't have a wide angle lens for my camera.
This guy pretty much sums up how much we enjoyed Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral.
No comments:
Post a Comment