On a work trip a few months ago, we held a Roadshow event at the Houston Space Center. I made it a point then to try and work it out so that we could visit on our way back to California, and we were able to make that happen today.
We got there when the opened at 10am, and were there till after 3:30 in the afternoon. We got to see all of the exhibits, take the big tram tour, and even see a couple of their demonstration shows. They even have a moon rock that we got to touch!
On the tram tour I took a few months ago, we got to go see where the astronauts train for missions, such as ISS, the Space Shuttle, and the new Mars missions. While that was closed today, we did get to go into a new area they just opened yesterday. Our tour was the third to be able to go in and see the old mock-up test Shuttle that was used for EVERY Space Shuttle mission. This mock-up allowed them to test all the equipment, from an engineering and functionality standpoint, prior to any launch.
There is also a museum of sorts, or collection of artifacts. It was odd, in that you really had to look for it to find it, but it held a bunch of information and items from the space programs history. I think Molly was impressed to hear about Skylab, and to see the real Saturn V rocket in “Rocket Park”.
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