Kennedy Space Center! I've been wanting to come to Cape Canaveral for some time, and while we didn't manage to get lucky enough to time our visit with an actual rocket launch, maybe that just means we'll have to come back someday.
Especially since we didn't have time to see any of the nature-related things in the area either (like manatees!). As soon as I started browsing the KSC website I knew we'd need to spend every possible minute making maximum use of our entry fee (and also that we wouldn't have time to see everything there even).
So while I was highly focused that week on not getting sick (so we could get on the cruise, which was screening passengers for any COVID symptoms), we went and braved the crowds at the space center. And washed our hands a lot.
Live love and prosper, Astronaut Friend:
John can move the world, or the whole sky even - his training lately has been paying off:
Space Shuttle rocket model - life size, I believe:
We started right away toward the Space Shuttle Atlantis, our last remaining shuttle to visit (after Enterprise, Discovery, and Endeavour). First, a gathering in a theater...
The dramatic unveiling of Atlantis reminded us that we weren't far from Orlando/Disney, quite an impressive introduction to this space shuttle "in flight". Hello Atlantis, it's great to finally meet you!
An item of note is that the folks in Los Angeles are hoping to eventually display Endeavour in the upright launch position, which would be super cool to see someday.
The Canada Arm, used for many missions in space:
A wonderful look into the cargo bay:
A quote from Neil DeGrasse Tyson describing how the Hubble Space Telescope was repaired, along with one of many amazing images from it:
An early shuttle computer...
Which was named SPOC! Coincidence? I think not. They should have added "Kiosk" to the end of the acronym though.
Hey, another Star Trek reference - astronaut Rick Searfoss was onboard our first Star Trek cruise and gave some excellent presentations about his time in actual space (one of the few - maybe the only one - on board the ship who had been there for real). RIP Mr. Searfoss.
An unexpected Stephen Colbert sighting - he just pops up when you least expect it sometimes:
Here we have the Combined Operational Load-Bearing External Resistance Treadmill! Too funny.
More Star Trek - as part of the memorial to Michael Anderson and the crew of Space Shuttle Columbia:
A photo of John Glenn going back to space on shuttle Discovery, super cool:
The NASA Airstream bus that transported astronauts:
On the bus tour out past the control center:
Tesla cars parked at a SpaceX building, woot!
One of the SpaceX launch pads, so amazing to be this close to something we've been watching on webcasts for several years now:
Imagine being here and watching that!
A really nice tribute to Michael Collins, Neil Armstrong, and Buzz Aldrin:
Wait, where's the camera? I managed to capture one more Star Trek-related image before the screen changed... can you tell what was on my mind at the time?
Up-Goer Five, in real life! Ridiculously large and impossible to capture in a photograph. And so awesome to see.
Another attempt, along with an oversized notepad and "space pen":
One of the places you might could watch a launch, if you happened to be here at the right time:
Continuing the walk through the long building, finally to the front section and the "people box":
It's almost like we're on the moon too, playing golf, driving around:
But first, imagine having to travel there and back in this!
An actual NASA capsule, rescued from the ocean:
A moon rock, and like most everything else here, it's the real thing:
So this is really neat, and I just happened to hear a tour guide explain that the artist, Alan Bean, was also an astronaut who walked on the moon in 1969!
Models of Mars rovers, so adorable.
SpaceX makes another appearance, in the hall of future missions:
And finally, as the sun is setting on this planet and they are asking people to leave so they can go home too, the rocket garden which we'll need to explore - another time!
In closing, a 1914 quote from another brave explorer:
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