Today we planned a visit to the Kennedy Space Center. This was especially exciting for me as I was in the middle of “Pale Blue Dot” by Carl Sagan. Its about astronomy and space, so my general interest in space was piqued. Once we paid the entrance fee, we started out looking out in the rocket garden. Here are full sized rockets from us space history.
Danelle and the kids sampled what it would be like to be in one of the pods as it was set to launch into space. I was fascinated by a full size replica of the boosters and external fuel tank from the shuttle program. Its hard to understand how big they are!
After looking around and lunch, we took the bus tour. It took us around the space center. We got to see the building they assembled the shuttle in. Note that the American flag painted on the side of the building is 21 stories tall. That is one HUGE building!
Later we went through a building celebrating the old Apollo program and its rockets. 
We sat through a simulation of the Apollo program in the control room and saw a video of what it would have been like. 
Most interesting to me was seeing the actual Atlantis space shuttle. 
I was both in awe of the physical size of it and how cheap it looked! It is hard to imagine that something with the outside that looks like a quilt was worthy to be in space and come back. 
The photo above is the rear section of the shuttle. You can see the damage to the heat tiles from actual usage of the shuttle. I realized how much I was impressed with the shuttle when I realized that I was alone. Danelle and the kids had continued on to look at other stuff as I was still in awe taking all I could read and see!
What was really fantastic about the space center is the other physical stuff the kids could do to have fun and stay busy. Between the simulator and slide, they were quite content! 
This for me was the best attraction of the whole vacation!
Hogan Haake