ALL ASHORE

This is always a fun week in Fort Lauderdale. And it's just starting. You see, the fleet's in town and I'm not talking about cruise ships. Nope, I'm talking about the Navy and the Coast Guard - that kind of fleet. It's even called Fleet Week, a big annual event in South Florida that brings military vessels and military women and men to Port Everglades and thereabouts. For the next several days, they'll be visible all over this community, crisp white uniforms and funny white hats wandering in packs along A1A looking for some version or other of R&R. They'll find a warm welcome here, as always, with lots of free meals and drinks thrown in by appreciative citizens. It's nice to see.

This year, there will be two Navy ships, a submarine and a Coast Guard cutter. One Canadian ship also will be in the military mix at the port. The estimated number of sailors who will be joining us for the next few days: more than 1,000. Like I said, white will be a very "in" color around Fort Lauderdale this week.

The public will be touring those vessels, with some 5,000 people already registered to climb aboard. And there's a public exhibit opening on Tuesday, something called Fleet Landing South Florida. This is an educational, and promotional, tool for the Navy that includes a flight simulator and plenty of sailors who will be only too happy to chat about their work. You can find all this right beside the Galleria Mall at the southeast corner of Northeast 26^th Avenue and Sunrise Boulevard. Sounds like fun. But the rah-rah and razzle-dazzle stuff aside, there's another aspect to Fleet Week that most of us don't see. Many sailors spend part of their precious shore leave doing some wonderful community service projects around this area. I don't know what they have planned this time, but in the past they've helped construct homes with Habitat for Humanity, for instance. I find something very encouraging about seeing our service men and women putting their muscle to use in this way, especially when they could just be out playing non-stop for seven days. So I say good for them - bravo. It's great to have these folks back with us and I hope they all enjoy a terrific break from their seagoing routines. They've earned it.