Military History Trifecta – Gulf Coast
We spent Spring Break doing a military history bonanza. We started in New Orleans at the National World War II Museum. This museum is fabulous. It has a huge number of artifacts along with multiple stories about WWII area folks (combatants and noncombatants). Almost every room has audio/visual materials and there are touch screens throughout with even more data. They also have an additional “hangar” type building with WWII era planes. You can get a birds eye view of the planes by climbing stairs to catwalks. Make sure you get to this museum early because it gets very crowded. The only downside was the number of people. In some of the rooms it was difficult to move because of the crowd.
Next up, the USS Alabama in Mobile. This is a whole complex with the USS Alabama battleship and the USS Drum submarine as the main draws. The park itself has multiple planes, tanks and other vehicles that are outside the battleship entrance. These are free (though I think there is an admission/parking charge). Inside the paid area, you can go all through the battleship and climb up and down. The stairs are steep so be careful. There are also hundreds of knee knockers so watch out. Next you can go to a hangar that has another 30 or so planes inside. These are all neat to see too. Finally, there is a patrol boat on the way to the USS Drum. You can go through one level of the submarine. If you think battleships are tight, submarines are claustrophobic. It is definitely worth seeing what those guys went through on subs.
Finally, the third place to stop is the National Naval Air Museum in Pensacola. This is on an active naval base so you have to show ID of every adult in the car. The line to get in the base was relatively long (took about 15 minutes). The museum itself is free though. This museum has well over 100 planes. This museum is fabulous. If you like planes or models this is great. There are models of all of the carriers from the US Navy. There are planes starting with old biplanes through modern fighters. I especially loved the very old planes. I have never seen that many pre-WWII planes in one place. There is also an ME 262 which was the first jet fighter (German). There is a cockpit from a MIG-21 which is also very cool. All in all, I cannot recommend this museum enough.
If you want to add one more historical stop, try Fort Morgan at the entrance to Mobile Bay. This is a Civil War era fort that is also pretty cool.
