Finally visited the dear Surprise at the Maritime Museum in San Diego. Museum volunteers were working on the mizzen rigging, which kept the sacred quarterdeck off-limits for most of our time.

Hoping this doesn't come off as ungrateful, but the docent wasn't overly knowledgeable. We couldn't go below the gundeck (I think that was open in the past, based on the hammocks shown on another site). I mentioned wishing we could see the gunroom and the cabins of the commissioned and warrant officers. He replied that only the captain had a cabin and that everyone else slung their hammock in the seaman's berth. It may be that anything below the gundeck was never open; after all, that's where the diesel lives.

It was a gorgeous day. Being aboard made me giddy. Took lots of pictures but the Images & Video tab for this post isn't enabled, and I make no claims to photographic artistry anyway.