The Navy Seals do land navigation training at Mt. Laguna! Who knew? We certainly didn’t. It’s the third and final phase of Basic Underwater Demolition/Seal Training. While we were biking we kept seeing young men in full military fatigues with heavily loaded backpacks. One evening two of them were walking through the campground so I asked, “What’s up? What are you guys doing?”  His response was, “Land nav.” Amelia asked if it was fun. The first guy said, “No.” The second guy was dragging and didn’t say anything.  At this point we still didn’t know who these guys were.

We were also seeing super fit guys in dark blue t-shirts. They didn’t seem approachable, so we didn’t really ask them a bunch a questions. Later we found out they were the Seal instructors.

On our last day of riding there was a commotion in the meadow with a Sheriff’s helicopter. We couldn’t tell if it was a rescue or a training. The guy we were talking to while watching the helicopter was very knowledgeable, and we assumed he was just a hiker.  We told him about all the young guys doing land nav. He said yeah, he was one of the instructors. So naturally I asked why he wasn’t in a dark blue t-shirt like all the other guys. His response was, “It makes it too easy for them to see me.” He’s been a Seal for twenty years and answered all our questions. He was one of those guys you could easily talk to for hours. Our brief conversation was quite fascinating.

 

360 degree views

 

Dang! I was going to make a nice slow cooker chili. 😭