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Despite a malfunction with the video camera, Greg was able to salvage some glimpses of NASA with the help of brochures. Heartbroken after the day's adventure filled with what we thought was fabulous video, we discovered our tape had crinkled and our camera didn't let us know. The day was great anyway with walks through the new visitor centers and peeks at actual space station pieces scheduled to go up in October.
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Excited after a great day, Preston and Brooklyn stop to get their picture taken in front of an actual retired space shuttle. They enjoyed going through it and seeing the cargo bay doors, where the astronauts sleep, and they found where they go to the bathroom especially funny. Seeing the "Mirror to the Sky" astronaut memorial was also impressive for both kids and adults. Preston still looks forward to going to space camp one day.
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Although not a good picture, the Astronaut Memorial is massive. After the space shuttle Columbia accident, an organization raised the money to construct this monument in honor of all astronauts that have lost their lives. There are six plaques which contain from 1 to 7 names of astronauts that have died in space, as well as Gus, Virgil and White who died while on a training mission during the Apollo era. The idea behind the memorial is that it tracks the sun's rays and reflects the energy though the granite and projects the names into heaven.
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This is the flight deck of an actual shuttle that is no longer used. Everything is original.
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Brooklyn, as always, knows exactly when to take a cat nap. Anytime you put her into a moving vehicle, such as the bus tour around NASA, she's the first one out. However, Greg made sure to wake her up during the interesting parts of the tour.
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This is the launch deck where the shuttles are mounted. There are five of these which are movable. When a shuttle mission is slated, this launch deck will be moved into the vehicle assembly building and the shuttle, solid rocket boosters and external fuel tank will be piggy backed onto the deck. The deck and shuttle will then be moved to the launch site.
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Although we missed the landing two days prior to this, the launch site remains from the mission which was just flown.
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All of us have seen mission control from the inside, but not the outside. The location is three miles away from both launch sites. The spectators and news media set up just to the left of the site. Families of the crew no longer sit at this location after the Columbia accident. They are located at another facility so they will not be photographed.
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A lunar car interested Preston. He thought the radio antenna was too large to pick up his favorite radio station.
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Simulating a moon landing was the goal for Preston and Brooklyn. This simulator gave them a good idea of why there is only one commander during a moon landing. The landing was not successful with Preston at the throttles and Brooklyn at the wheel.
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Preston still has a lot of growing to fit into the suit. The suit is located in the new Apollo V Saturn Rocket Facility. Inside the building is an actual Saturn rocket which was slated to fly, but was canceled.
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On the rear of the Saturn V rocket are five gigantic rocket engines. You could easily fit a car into each rocket. First thing Preston said was that the middle engine was the one that cut out during launch on the movie "Apollo 13".
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The vehicle assembly building is the largest building in the world. You could fit five Empire State Buildings into this space. It takes over two hours to open the doors to exit the space shuttle. Although not shown, to the left are three buildings which house 3 of the 4 space shuttles.
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After NASA we decided a stop at the beach would be nice so we headed to Cocoa Beach. On the way a stop at Port Canaveral provides us with a glimpse of Carnival's "Fantasy". It was getting ready to journey on a four day cruise. Greg and Susan went on this ship for their first four day cruise four years ago. Dennis was very impressed and decided that a cruise might be coming up in the near future.
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Being the dare devil that she is, Brooklyn decides that body surfing is cool so dad helps her with the basics... hold your breath, hands out and go. Grandma stands near by just in case she went from body surfing to scuba diving. Later Preston too tried the new sport, but preferred "fighting" the waves and was sure he had won as he thought the waves were most definitely smaller before we left.
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Brooklyn is finally able to lure Dennis in to try the water on his first trip to the ocean. Though he didn't get much beyond knee-high, Brooklyn was satisfied as was Dennis. Both kids utilized their much-improved swimming skills to fight the waves and even loved going under. Neither was afraid and, in fact, both had to be called back to more "shallow" water more than once.
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