January 2, 2017

Kennedy Space Center


Welcome to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Let's go in and explore this awesome complex.

The first thing you see is the Rocket Gardens.

This is the largest rocket in the gardens.  Keep in mind it's size for later.

They have a mock up of a capsule that you can climb into for photos.

Our real destination for the day was ATLANTIS.

We're super excited to get to see the shuttle.

The mock up of the fuel tank and rockets is huge.

After a video presentation you are exited nose-to-nose with Atlanis.

You have to see this thing in person to appreciate just how big it is.

Here you can see the Canadarm that was used to retrieve satellites out in space.

 
The money bay is quite large.

I honestly cannot believe I am standing in front of Atlantis.

Looking from the tail.

The rockets on the back of Atlantis.

One of the Canadarms extended.  Apparently these arms couldn't lift their own weight on Earth.

Looking at the bottom of the shuttle at all of the heat deflection panels.

A mock up of the Hubble Telescope.

Space suit used for space walks.

A mock up of the control center of the shuttle.

This was pretty popular with the kids.

Here's a mock up of one of the rockets from a shuttle.

Seriously, the shuttle is just massive.

To get to the lower level you can ride a slide that is at the angle of decent that the shuttle took to land.

A crawl-through mock up of the International Space Station.

Mock up of a space toilet.

This is the van that used to take astronauts to the launch pads before going into space.

They have a pretty cool simulator of a space shuttle launch you can ride.

Let's take the tour bus out to the Saturn V building.

Here comes our bus.

This is the real Saturn Control Center.  

Remember that rocket I showed you at the start of this trip report?  It would fit in one section of this Saturn rocket.

Speaking of sections, the Saturn rocket is made up of 3.

These sections are so big that I cannot even take single photo of the entire rocket.

Here is the tip of the rocket where the astronauts would ride.

Lunar landing module.

A mock up of the control module for a Saturn rocket.

A mock up of the lunar rover.

Charles Schultz made a special Snoopy as the mascot for the Saturn program.

Some of the different space suits concepts.

Some look like the could have actually been used.

Then there was this one.

This is an actual module that was used in a Saturn mission.

Standing under the Saturn rocket.  It seems to just go on forever (and this is the middle of it).

This is looking across the lake at some of the launch pads.  

This is the Vehicle Assembly Building.

They are currently building components for the Mission to Mars.

Speaking of that mission, here is a model of what the rocket will look like.

This is a mock up of the Mars Explorer which they will use once they land on Mars.

Here's what the suspension looks like on the Mars Explorer.

The Spirit/Opportunity Rover

The Sojourner Rover.

The newest exhibit building at the complex is the Heroes and Legends Building.

This has a lot of exhibits from the Mercury Missions.

A space suit from a mission.

Here is the control center from the Mercury Mission.

The complex also has the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame.
This complex is amazing and one could literally spend all day here, like we did.