WOW! Joe, THANKS! THANKS THANKS!
You were an awesome guide, and I couldn't help but feel a bit priviledged as you explained stuff and other people were wondering how we got the personal tour guide!
We got there a bit late to Canaveral after a traffic jam of about 15 miles through lower Palm Beach-on the turnpike! UG. By the time we finally arrived and met Joe, it was lunch time. We listened to Al Worden from Apollo 15, which was the fourth manned lunar landing and the longest lunar visit.
After lunch we took off via bus (this week and next week are the two busiest times of the year at KSC, wear sneakers and be prepared to wait in line for everything) for a tour of the VAB (Vehicle Assembly Building), and eventually over to where a Saturn 5 Rocket is on display. Seeing the rocket garden in the beginning, I was surprised at how small the rockets were. I was expecting these big monsters, and seeing some of the earlier spaceships, one wonders how you could live 2 weeks with 2 others in the space of a Volkswagen beetle. Anyways, upon seeing the Saturn V, my eyes widened at the magnitude of this machine. Holy Cow! Awesome!
All along the way, Joe told us stories about pranks employees played on each other, daredevil stunts, and tidbits and glimpses of technology that we would never have known if Joe wasn't with us.
The replica of the Space Shuttle was pretty neat, as it was to scale.
Finally at the end of the day, KSC did one more viewing of one of the IMAX films. In one part, they showed the astronauts in the pool in Houston, wonder if we could dive that some day?? We finally parted ways, tired and happy.
Joe, my offer still stands, you have a couch anythime you are in the area, and I look forward to diving with ya soon! THANK YOU so much for guiding us.
The next day we took off for Merrit Island National Wildlife Refuge. We saw so many birds, did some hiking, and just enjoyed the overcast skies and sweet breeze, thankful that we weren't cooking under the Florida sun. We were looking for Roseate Spoonbills, a pink bird with an odd shaped bill. We were not disappointed when we started counting how many we saw-38 in total! Also, we saw so many alligators, egrets, herons, ibis, snowy egrets, and other birds that we needed our reference guide to identify them.
Great 2 day vacation. I look forward to going to Canaveral again.
