Re: Went absolutely nowhere today - and had a ton of fun.

[Ol Shy & Bashful]

Kev
Along the coast at Pt Loma there are the remains of a number of old
coastal gun emplacements. I lived in Azure Vista (ever heard of it?
Between Ocean Beach and Pt Loma) during and right after the war. We
used to visit them and get the little boxes of cereal; from the troops.
When the bunkers were abandoned after the war we often played in them
and found a lot of left behind equipment.
The museum out there describes them in some detail.
Rocky

[Ol Shy & Bashful]

I was in a USMC family and knew Camp Elliot well and Camp Matthews too.
I recall the kids being killed by the old ordnance. It wasn't all that
uncommon and even now Tierra Santa has stuff uncovered during
construction projects as you know. I spent many a day on the range at
Matthews with my Dad (he was a Master Sergeant). I can remember when
Pacific Coast highway was covered with camo netting and lots of false
buildings to disguise the old Convair and Consolidated Vultee plants.
The buildings at MCRD were all camo and when I was a DI there in the
late 50's, some of the roofs were still camo tile!
Early 40's we lived just up the hill from Lindberg a couple blocks and
had an anti-aircraft battery across the street (Army) and we'd go visit
with those guys. Later we moved out to Azure Vista towards the end of
the war. Seems surreal to fly around SAN and remember all the old
airports that are vague memories now and to see how it has changed in
the last 60+ years. Wowwwwwww............
Rocky

[Ol Shy & Bashful]

The old 101 ran along the west edge of Mathews and is now the campus
for the university. On I-5 you can still see parts of the old pistol
range on the east side of the road. I stopped there about 10-15 years
ago, jumped the fence and took a walk with my camera. Ended up spending
a couple hours wandering around the old camp remembering my time there
as a kid, then as a recruit, then as a shooting competitor, and then as
a DI. I did a short photo pstory called "The Ghosts of Camp Matthews".
too bad it has drifted into the vague mists of time along with old
Peaks Airport that was very near the site of one of the hotels on PCH
and almost at the mouth of the old Cudahy Slough.
Yep, I'm gettin older by the day!

[Ol Shy & Bashful]

Kev
I think what was Camp Kearney is now Miramar. There were so many camps
up on the mesa its hard to remember where each of them was.