BoatBanter.com - View Single Post - A Look At Officer Training In The US Navy and Merchant Marine

Mr. Luddite[_4_]

On 8/25/2017 12:01 PM, wrote:
On Fri, 25 Aug 2017 07:25:12 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 8/24/2017 11:12 PM, wrote:
On Thu, 24 Aug 2017 22:07:07 -0400,
wrote:

On Thu, 24 Aug 2017 19:50:57 -0500, Boating All Out
wrote:

What do they use to make bug juice?

===

Bug Juice is any powdered drink like Kool-Aid.

The CG fed us better ;-)

Navy shore commands and the larger ships usually had good food. The
smaller ships like the destroyer escorts I was on didn't have the
storage capacity for a lot of fresh food for longer cruises. We ate
well for the first few days but then it got pretty bad. Most of us
stocked up our lockers with canned food and other treats that didn't
need refrigeration.

The evaporators could never keep up with the demand for fresh water so
we were always on water hour rationing while underway. Taking a real
shower became a once in a great while deal.

We were on a smaller ship than you and we were at sea for 5 weeks at a
time. I am not sure why they couldn't keep you in food. They had huge
"reefers" and lots of dry stores. They generally had fresh eggs for
the whole cruise but they mixed in some powder I am sure.
We also seemed to have enough fresh water. Maybe you just had more
guys on board. We had around 75 on a 311' ship. These things were
originally sea plane tenders so they were all "tank". We carried
enough fuel to sail around the world a couple times and I assume they
had big fresh water tanks. We did have a strict "sea shower" rule but
you could take a salt water shower as long as you wanted.
The trick was you took a long "Hollywood" shower in sea water then did
a quick rinse in fresh.

Different ships for different purposes. Based on your description and
vintage it sounds like you were on a Barnegat class cutter. Only 4
feet shorter than the DE's I was on but, according to Wiki, your cutter
had a crew compliment of 215. What was the name or hull number?