A lot of the information was very technical. They had a lot of different rocket engines and that sort of thing. They also had a lot of information on Huntsville's role in U.S. Space Travel. Huntsville is the home of Redstone Arsenal and the U.S. Missile Command. It is also where the German rocket scientists came after World War II in order to work on the U.S. rocket program. Von Braun, the famous rocket scientist, led the group which created all of the early U.S. rockets of the 1950's and 1960's, including those that helped us get to the moon, and later work in Huntsville included the design and development of the current Space Shuttle. Not bad for a little town in north Alabama, eh? Von Braun started a legacy that continues today. Huntsville is one of the most educated cities in the world, with among the highest PhDs per capita on the planet. Rocket research is still a core part of Huntsville, where NASA is developing the next generation space shuttle.
It was all very interesting and a little overwhelming. We enjoyed a lot of the exhibits, though. They had a mockup of the lunar landing module, a walk-through space station module, and some fun things like spacesuits and other artifacts from various space trips. I rode a goofy Mars "simulator" - by simulator, I mean it simulated what it would be like if you took a trip to Mars, went through some sort of warp portal, and ended up on a roller coaster at a Martian theme park. :-)
Outside they have a large number of rockets on display in the Rocket Garden. Here I am overlooking the Garden, eating the obligatory freeze dried astronaut ice cream sandwich ($3.50).
Here's Katie in the Rocket Garden. I always knew she was tall, but this really hammers it home!
There were a lot of areas of the museum that we forgot to photograph. They had a lot of space camp activities going on, so there were lots of space camp kids around. Our favorite was the launching of the homemade paper rockets. They have a specialized pressurized air launching pad out in the Rocket Garden, and some of the results were very impressive! Some of the paper rockets made it more than 100 yards up into the air.
Overall it seems like they have really world-class artifacts at the museum. They could use a little work with the presentation and organization - it did seem a little scattered and wasn't as cohesive as it could have been. Still, it's definitely worth a visit.
On the way home we stopped in Decatur, AL for a visit to Big Bob Gibson's BBQ. As far as I am concerned, this is the best BBQ on Earth. It's won dozens of awards, and every time I go there I find gastronomic heaven. This time it was in the form of a half rack of ribs and a quarter chicken. :-) If you are ever within 100 miles of this place, you need to go!
After that we headed home to digest the massive amount of BBQ we ate (we didn't save room for dessert. That didn't stop us; Katie walked out with some chocolate pie to go. The same woman has been making them for 50 years). A fun day trip to the Rocket City.
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