Oriskany (CV 34) - Naval Cruise Book

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RISKANY sailors first met European civilization in Sicily. Newcomers to the Mediterranean were puzzled by what they saw. The island itself, mountainous and green, looked ideally suited for a pleasant life of hunting, fishing and swim- ming. But the people dressed in patches, lived in shells of houses and enjoyed watching the fantastic Americanos. At the Fleet Landing in Augusta, itinerant merchants and peddlers did such a rush business that several of them tramped back home a couple of times during the day to replenish their stocks. After buying scarves and dolls, sailors noticed the i'Made in Moroccoil tags. This was chalked up to experience. The men promised themselves they wouldn't buy imported souvenirs next time. lt was a new experience, too, dealing in foreign currencies. Coins seldom changed hands. Practically all denominations of Italian lira came in paper money. Metal, it seemed, had too many more valuable uses. Five lire notes corresponded in size to cigarette coupons back in the States. The 10,000 lire bills were almost large enough to wrap a carton of cigarettes. To peddlers and shop keepers, it made no difference whether they were offered lira or American dollars. For easy figuring. f 600 lire to the dollar. haracters on lesson to a gave a fast then looked prices were translated at the rate o Sometimes higher rates were offered by furtive c street corners. One such deal, however, taught a whole busload of sailors. The curbstone broker count. 'Une thousand, two thousand, he said and both ways for the police. Four thousand, five, fifty-five hundredg sixty-five hundred, seven thousand, he Hnished off. The currency changed hands. W IC 6 the broker disappeared. So had so h'l th sailor recounted, me of the 7,000 lire. Most experiences on Sicily educated Oriksany sailors in more le may be happy cilian males smoked carved satisfying ways. The men learned that peop with few material possessions. Si First liberty in the med . pipes full of contentment. The brown-eyed young girls enjoyed dancing and simple pleasures. Traffic cops in Catania per- formed as dramatically as a major league pitcher winding up. History was real on the island. ln an open field on the road to Catania from Augusta, a monument recalled a bloody battle of the recent war. Where the wind now bent the growing wheat, German soldiers once retreated and died before power- ful American forces. Among the broken pillars and tumbled walls of ancient Syracuse, the glory that was Greece still haunted the ruins. Citizens of the Creek city of Corinth 2,800 years before had built a colonial outpost on the site. Centuries later-but still thousands of years ago, the Romans had imposed their more militarized civilization upon the colony. More centuries and more conquerors: dark-skinned Arabs, blue-eyed Normans, in- quisitive Spaniards, had left their mark on the island and its people, and then gone into history. Despite the centuries and tides of culture, the island re- mained physically little changed, except, perhaps, for the decrease in water supplies in wells and springs and river bot- toms. The high ridges, a reappearance of the Apennine spine of the ltalian boot just 20 miles away, were dominated by Mount Etna, 10,741 feet, the highest and most active volcano in Europe. Fairly regularly every six years, Etna sent its hot lava rolling down the steep slopes toward the fields and homes around its base. During the intervals, houses and fields crept back up again. To the people of Catania on the lower slopes of the volcano, the sleeping giant was more to be loved than feared, but mostly it was forgotten. Oriskany sailors felt differently. They passed and repassed Etna several times. To them it was a landmark, a natural aid to navigation, and always there for the wandering seaman to take his bearings from the strait or in memory. 'ff --Av 4 .1-sf' ww . ,. , ., ,. . . Fresh from the States, Oriskany sailors learn there have been many wars in Sicily.

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Y .1 - , 7 L' 8315 '4 vi' . ? H as . -W.. L ,, 4 K f -f ....Qat.L.1.itL-f the glory that was Greece . . . REECE compared so favorably to the previous landfall at Sicily that many Oriskany sailors still think of Athens as the best liberty port in the Mediterranean. It didn't take so long to drop the hook at Piraeus. The people were better dressed, especially the women. Restaurants looked cleaner and menus offered greater variety. Bars sold American beer, although they charged steep prices. English words and United States accents fell on ears sharpened to recognize compatriots. The Creeks seemed to like Americans and had rolled out the carpet to welcome Oriskany officers and men. We were Allies. We were accepted. No one stared at us in the streets. Athenians had seen our uniforms and our Sport jackets before. They knew what we wanted, dinner and cocktails Hi the King George Hotel, Budweiser and a ham sandwich at the American Bar, music and dancing, Coca-Cola and coffee at the Navy Canteen, a hike through the world-famous ruins on the Acropolis and at Corinth, a swim in the Aegean Sea, and some quiet entertainment in the evening on the side streets. After Sicily we did not expect too much of Europe. But Athens restored S0me of our American regard for the Old World. In hotels and attractive restaurants, we tried steaks prepared in a way we had almost forgotten. And 9354115 the bill in tens of thousands of Greek drachmas, though equal to only' a few dollars in United States currency, made us feel like traveling millionaires, Because there had been thousands of American sailors in Athens before US and many more would come after, a recreation center off the beaten track was ready with dance floor and volunteer hostesses, sandwiches and dough- nuts and iced soft drinks. The Oriskany band alternated with musicians f1'0m other ships to keep Navy jitterbugs busy. Outside the high wire fences, young Greek fellows and girls solemnly watched the sailors eat and dance. In Shop windows of main squares and fashionable streets, some of the Enest pr0dllCtS of all Europe were on display. Economy-sized CMS looked like midgets at first. But the multi-gadgeted cameras, the p recious stones in jewelers' windows, the fine Swiss timepieces, the excellent fabrics of shirts and bathing trunks and suits and sheer negligees, perfumes in crystal, magnums of champagne and pinch bottles of whisky, matched the best New York could offer. Sailors parted with many beloved dollars in return for these even more desired luxuries. More than anything else, however, Greece will be rememberd for the Acropolis and other sites of ancient ruins. There was the Parthenon. Weather and adversity had softened the sharp lines cut by Periclean sculptors some 2,500 years ago. The marble columns felt sandy under fingertips. Still the great energy and unbounded imagination involved in its conception could be recognized whether up close or at a distance. A 130-mile bus ride took several parties to ruins outside Athens. The tour seemed to take as much walking as riding. The ancient Greeks had built acres of finely-chiseled structures in out-of-the-way places. All the walk- ing was taken in easy stride by the guides who moved from fallen capital to broken pillar like mountain goats. At Corinth, the abandoned marble city and its classic temples lay toppled on a plain sloping to the blue Aegean. Atop a sheer cliff behind the city was the Acro-Corinth, a fortified place of refuge for a people and a culture that has otherwise disappeared from the earth. Almost no free mementos were available. At Eleusis, sacred to forgotten mysteries, the guides pointed out a hollow rock once used to store the cups of ancient rites. Next to the rock was a smaller stone used as a cap to shut the safe. Both were obviously too big to fit into the busses. The precious relics were gone. Blocks of carved marble were scattered and symbols around, the smallest weighing at least ten pounds. Swimming at Kineta Beach, midway between Corinth and Athens, was ged over the centuries. There were no bathhouses but plenty of low unchan shrubbery and tideworn rock to make into dressing rooms. The clear water was ice-cold to the foot but good to exercise in. The bottom was stony and hard on the tender feet of modern sailors.