On Saturday we had the chance to tour the USS Mesa Verde while it's docked in Panama City awaiting commissioning on Saturday, December 15th. It was built in Pascagoula, Mississippi and was launched in August 2007. It is an amphibious transport dock designed to transport and land Marines and their equipment and supplies. Some stats on the ship: Length - 684 ft; Beam - 105 feet; displacement - approximately 24,900 tons full load; crew - 360 sailors (28 officers, 332 enlisted), three marines. Here's the website if you'd like to read more about it: http://ccmesaverde.com/. Her namesake is Mesa Verde National Park in southwestern Colorado. We were fortunate enough to tour Mesa Verde and some of the cliff dwellings there while visiting Em's brother, Larry and family who live near there in Ridgway, Colorado.
The next ship to be commissioned in this LPD class will be the USS Green Bay (LPD 20)!
Quite an imposing sight! 
This is where we entered the ship. Paint was still being applied to this side of the ship.
This young officer was our tour guide. You can see how these little guys were quite impressed with the whole experience! There were quite a few retired Navy personnel on the tour also.
This is the view from the bridge - pretty impressive!
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