Spring Training Trip - Day 7

We started the day with breakfast at the base dining facility (aka “the chow hall”).  Things have changed considerably in feeding the troops over the years.  The facility at Vandenberg has been privatized, is located in a modern building, and features a wide variety of cafeteria style selections including made-to-order omelets, eggs as-you-like them and lots of healthy breakfast options.  Never fear though, SOS on biscuits is still available and apparently is a popular breakfast option.

We left Vandenberg about 9:30 am after filling up with gas on base and then topping-off the propane tank in Lompoc.  It was an easy ride down Highway 101 to just south of Ventura, then turning towards the coast through vegetable fields to Point Mugu Naval Air Weapons Station.

The naval support base is part of a consolidated military organization that also includes nearby Naval Base Ventura Port Hueneme and an outlying landing facility at San Nicolas Island, one of the nearby Channel Islands. The consolidated command, Naval Base Ventura County (NBVC), is a major Naval aviation shore command and a Naval construction force mobilization center that provides airfield, seaport and base support services to fleet operating forces and related shore activities.

Point Mugu is also part of the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division (NAWCWPNS), the Navy's research, development, test evaluation, and in-service engineering center for weapons systems associated with air warfare. A major base mission is to test and evaluate in-flight weapons systems in restricted airspace over the Pacific Ocean. Point Mugu also maintains and operates the air, land, and sea Naval Western Test Range Complex (NWTRC) and supports missile launch operations and flight tracking from Vandenberg AFB.

Although entrance to the base is controlled by security personnel, there are a lot of civilian employees on base and the level of base security doesn’t seem quite as intense as we experienced at Vandenberg.  An interesting difference between Navy and Air Force base security is that the Air Force no longer requires registration of vehicles and the display of special registration tags permanently displayed on the vehicle windshield.  Base entry to Air Force Bases now requires hand-held scanning of each occupant’s military ID card by base security guards to verify entrance eligibility. They are no longer concerned with what vehicle you are driving, although all vehicles are subject to search and inspection if they choose to do so.

The Navy, on the other hand, still requires each vehicle entering the base to be registered, with verification of ownership, current registration, and proof of insurance.  Your military ID card is still checked upon entry, but not scanned.  Consequently, upon entry to Point Mugu today, we were informed we needed to register our vehicles to get on the base.  It didn’t matter that the Air Force no longer requires vehicle registration.  So, we went to the Pass & ID office and registered both vehicles.  We now have stickers on the RV and VW showing the vehicles are registered at the Point Mugu Naval Base.  This is O.K. with us as it should preclude any future hassles with base entry at different service facilities in the future; the tags are good until 2015.  However, we are not sure what the Army and Marines require these days for base entry.  We’ll find out about the Marines when we get to Camp Pendelton on Saturday.

The RV Park on base is right on the beach and adjoins a base hotel.  The park is almost empty right now so we have a space very close to the ocean.  After lunch in the RV and resting awhile, we took a walk on the beach before dinner.  There is a seawall on the north end of the beach that can only be walked around when the tide is out. Since it wasn’t, we walked south about a half of mile to where the Point Mugu Estuary enters the ocean.  (As an aside, the difference between a lagoon and an estuary is that a lagoon is subject to closure by sand in the winter and an estuary remains open to the ocean year-round.)  We saw lots of birds in the estuary as well as a harbor seal rookery.  The weather remains beautiful – mild temperatures, lots of sun, and little wind.  In fact, we transitioned to shorts and sandals today and hope we can continue to do so as the trip continues.

We ate dinner in the RV, making another dent in the leftovers we brought from home.  We will not continue to describe these leftovers for the remainder of the trip – they are almost all gone anyway.  We also have a lot of food with us that has not been precooked.

Day 7 Pictures