West Point in the Rain

The Hudson from the West Point Campus  
A place for outdoor concerts

We rented a car this morning and drove down to West Point for the 11a.m. two hour tour. It took over an hour to get there and just before we went into the visitor center I remembered leaving my wallet and driver's license in the boat! There are signs every where saying that you must have a photo ID to get into West Point. And that is excatly what the lady at the tour desk told us. I just figured I would sit in car or visitor center and work crossword puzzles until Walter got back. However, this nice lady took a chance and called the guard at the South Gate that we would be going through telling him I only had a credit card with my name on it. Walter had a picture of me with him when we were first dating... too funny! Like I even look like that now?! But the guard at the gate said it was okay... you know old ladies could really sabotage this country! :-0

It was a wonderful tour but really too fast and too short... so many questions we really didn't have time to ask. We took only a few pictures as it was raining lightly. Our tour guide was great and the father of a senior cadet there. We also had a young family on the tour whose dad was an alum and told a few funny stories about life there especially in the summer... he was hungry every summer. The younger cadets can't eat until the older ones do and if they do anything wrong they must go out to the parade field and stand there apologing to one of the statues of famous generals... like if they don't cut the dessert pie in 7 or 9 nice looking equal pieces!

The first chapel we went into was a large Protestant church. Italian Immigrants built it long ago with a motive: they were told that they would become U.S. Citizens if they finished it in 5 years. They finished the building in 18 months! It is huge and very beautiful. As we understood it the stain glass windows were given at different times by alumni classes over the years.

Chapel Photo from Internet

Inside Chapel

They can not be seen in this photo but pipes for the organ lined the upper part of the chapel.

Key Boards for huge Organ in this Chapel

This is the the parade field (The Plain) in front of MacArthur Hall where all the cadets eat in 20 minutes! The first year cadets must wait on the upper classmen before they can eat.

This is the building we saw yesterday approaching West Point on the water. We wondered what it might be since there were no windows. We thought it was perhaps an old fortress wall. Today we found out that it used to be the largest horseback training facility in the country but it is now offices and our guide said the Parent banquet/ball was held there. He also pointed out that there are few if any windows and on hot muggy days you can still smell the horses!!  

One of the most interesting places was the large grave yard where our guide told many stories. Many famous male and female military persons buried there. They are trying to close it out as it is getting very crowded. 300 years ago when it was started no one knew how popular a burial site it would be.  

    

We found a nice little Italian restaurant across the street from the Campus for lunch and then headed to Poughkeepsie to get the filters needed for the boat engines. The Mechanic in Atlantic City told us that our engines had the wrong filters and that may have caused our previous oil consumption problem.  Walter was so glad this place had them in stock!  And has already installed them and is now planning our cruise for tomorrow.

The rain poured down all afternoon but has let up some now.  I love the sound of rain.... good sleeping!