Submarine on the Arkansas River

One of the worlds longest serving submarines (if not THE longest submarine in service) can be found on the riverfront of Little Rock Arkansas. Originally launched as the USS Razorback in 1944 it served the US Navy in WWII and had an impressive war record.

After WWII it was modernized with a Guppy IIA conversion which made it more hydrodynamic underwater and less able to be be detected. The sail (Conning Tower) was much more streamlined than the WWII configuration. 

In 1970 the boat was sold to the Turkish Navy where it was in service until 2001 at which point it was sold and traveled to Little Rock and put on display in 2005.

This model shows the WWII configuration of the sub

Visitors enter the submarine by climbing down a vertical ladder from the main deck into the aft torpedo room

  

The water tight doors between compartments require some interesting body movements to allow easy passage

This shows the war history of SS394 including the five red stars indicating pilots rescued after their planes were shot down

The Galley

View looking down from the sail into the control room

Christmas tree board showing red and green lights indicating which openings are still open - All GREEN was required to dive the boat.

This is a good view of the more hydrodynamic sail of the USS Razorback in the GUPPY IIA configuration

Also on display is the Navy Tug boat HOYA (YT-146). This tug was in service at Pearl Harbor and was responsible for a tremendous amount of work after the bombing of the fleet. It help push the battleship NEVADA to beach herself after she made a run for the open ocean and was bombed by the Japanese who hoped to sink her and block the channel into the harbor. The HOYA then fought fires on the burning battleships and rescued sailors from the water.

There is a large and well detailed model of Pearl Harbor in the museum alongside the HOYA which shows the location of the ships at the time of attack and the locations of the HOYA after the battle and during the aftermath. It is most interesting.

Little Rock Street Car

One of the travel bargains of  Little Rock Arkansas is the streetcar that takes you thru town and gives tour guide type comments about what all you are seeing. The streetcars are in wonderful condition and are climate controlled. The ride is 50 cents for Seniors and takes about an hour. 

Streetcar bridge over the Arkansas river

there is a blue line and a green line route which are detailed on the map of the route

Various sights are found along the way

I like the reflection of the streetcar in the plate glass windows along the way

Bridges of Little Rock, Arkansas

We spent several days in Little Rock, Arkansas and were especially taken with their bridges. They have several pedestrian bridges across the river. These were former RR bridges with lift sections to clear the barge traffic on the river. They have been converted to pedestrian walkways with the lift portions permanently raised. At night they are especially well lit with constantly changing hues of LED provided color.

This is the pedestrian bridge which leads to the Clinton Presidential Library

We noticed a number of padlocks with initials on them hooked to various portion of the bridge. A Google search brought up the trend for lovers to "Lock" their love by closing an initialed padlock onto a permanent structure and throwing the key in the river. These are called "Love Locks".

The numbers of  "Love Locks" on the Little Rock bridges are rather few in number, but portions of Europe and especially Paris have had sections of bridge parapets collapse due to the weight of hundreds of padlocks. As you can  imagine, removal is difficult.