"Soldiers of Today and Yesterday"
" Honor,Dignity & Hope "

Back in 1985 I graduated from a small K-12 school in Southwest Louisiana. I got a regular job digging footers for concrete foundations. Needless to say I saw no real future in this. I was working with a fellow who had just gotten out of the Navy. He was complaining about our work and was threatening to go back into the Navy. I said I would go with him because I had dug about as much ditch as I wanted to dig. We split work early one day and went and talked to the Navy recruiter. This guy had over 30 years in and was one of the saltiest Sailors I had ever met. He asked me what I wanted to do in the Navy. My plan was to become a diesel mechanic. He assured me I could get that billet and signed me up guaranteeing me an "A" school, and in 4 years when I got out, I would be a diesel mechanic.

I talked to this recruiter in October and was scheduled to join on December 15^th, 1985. Needless to say I never went back to the ditch digging job and figured, I would bum around for 2 months. I picked up this Podunk job on a crab boat. For the next 2 months I emptied crab pots and baited them with the foulest smelling dead fish I had ever encountered. I was making $30 a day with all the crab and fish I could eat. Looking back, that was one of the funnest jobs I had. We drank beer the whole time we were working and it was nice being out on the Gulf.

Now it’s time for me to go to Boot Camp. My recruiter told me, all I needed was the clothes on my back and a coat since my Boot Camp was in Great Lakes Illinois. Remember, I am from Southwest Louisiana. The only time we see ice is when we open the freezer. I got to Great Lakes and this little short sucker keeps yelling at me and I am freezing my butt off. I was not interested in what he had to say. I wanted to get warm. Remember it was in the middle of December. It was below zero when we arrived. Boot Camp is 8 weeks. The first 5 days were known as "P" days or processing days. They gave me shots for everything. Stuff I had never heard of;  we were vaccinated for it. While I was in Boot Camp I applied for the SEALS and when I didn’t make that, I applied for Overseas Home Porting.

After 8 fun filled weeks in Boot Camp, I graduated and went to "A" school for 13 weeks. Remember I was going to be a diesel mechanic? I never saw one. Oh by the way, my "A" school was also in Great Lakes. I don’t know how those people live in that cold. At least school wasn’t as bad as Boot Camp. We still had PT (physical training) daily but we were used to it by now. After graduating from "A" school I went to Overseas Home Porting School. Can you believe this? I was shocked. But I’ll tell you what. You would be surprised what you need to know to be serviceman living abroad. Oh yeah, the ship I was going to, didn’t have medical facilities so the Navy had all my wisdom teeth pulled before leaving. They had not broken the surface yet. The Dentist said this was no problem. He could DIG them out. Very painful. Not fun.

After that I was shipped out to the USS Belknap, Gaeta Italy. I hit Italy in July 1986 and I left my morals back in the states. I was 18 years old, on my own, living in Italy and loved every minute of it. While stationed in Italy I visited Egypt, Sicily, France, Spain, Greece, Israel, Yugoslavia, Tunisia, Turkey, Morocco and Libya. We didn’t actually go to port in Libya. Kudaffe started his crap when we were there and were 10 miles off his coast daring him to come out and play. I remember we were 8 on and 4 off for three days. Brother that will take its toll on you.

I have so many sea stories in my head from all the ports we visited. Every country has its on story. We went to several ports in each country. When France pulled out of NATO, the admiral had every ship in the Med port in France to help boost their economy and try to convince them to re-join. I must say that Egypt is about the worst place I have ever been. We actually saw dead camels floating in the rivers. It was nasty.

Toulon France has the best GUT. The GUT is a string of bars. Bars on both sides of the street for as far as you can see. I am talking hundreds of bars. The bars were filled with "buy me drink" girls. These girls get you liquored up and convince you to buy them a bottle of champagne. The champagne is actually Austi Spumante and it cost $100 a bottle. I used to laugh at the fools buying it and hoping to get lucky. They never did. France also had the squish sandwich. They would make a submarine sandwich and put fries on it with Dijon mustard. They would then squish it on a waffle iron and it was awesome.

My next story will detail all the fun travels I had in Europe. Till then,

MM3 Ray LeBlanc USN Go Navy. Fly Navy, the divers need the work.