To Infinity and Beyond
13 December 2017 | Titusville, FL
Karen/Morning - sunny and cold
When we left Savannah we began the next curvy and winding part of the ICW - transversing some really shallow areas with cute names like “Hell Gate” with warnings to pass through during rising tides only. We never got stuck, but there were a few nail-biting moments!
Even from the water you can tell it’s Christmas time! Lots of the private piers were decorated with lights and wreaths, and the towns we passed through were all lit up. We spent a weekend in St Augustine, the oldest continuously occupied settlement in continental United States. I wanted to do some sightseeing, tour the old fort (Castillo de San Marcos), and go Christmas shopping in the town center. We were also in time to see their beautiful holiday celebration, Nights of Lights. A few days later we were near Datona and anchored for the night - sitting on the deck of the boat, watching the sunset - and we realized we had accidentally anchored next to the staging area for Datona’s Christmas Lighted Boat Parade! There dozens of them, all playing music and having a great time. The parade was mostly power boats, so we cheered extra loud at the sailboat entries. My photos didn’t turn out well, but the boats were beautiful!
The Space Coast! Ron and I have been married for forever and a day - and while I’ve always known that he liked the space program, I did not realize what a true “space geek” he was! We grew up in the 60s and 70s during the Gemini and Apollo programs, and our kids watched the Space Shuttle launches. Walter Cronkite described the launches on our black and white TV, and Houston had it’s own “Cadet Don” on a Saturday morning TV program (well, it was HOUSTON after all!) We even talked our Mom into buying us Tang to drink so we could be like the astronauts! And we all loved to watch Larry Hagman and Barbara Eden in “I Dream of Jeanie”. So it was no surprise when Ron decided to delay our sailing dates so that he could watch a launch from the Kennedy Space Center.
We arrived in Titusville, FL, a few days ago intending to watch a scheduled December 4th NASA launch. However, weather has become an issue and the launch has been delayed until the 15th. So we have taken a mooring ball at the Titusville Municipal Marina - a really friendly, comfortable place with very nice facilities. I rented a car for a couple of days so that we could run errands and spend a day at the Kennedy Space Center. We arrived at the center just after it opened at 0900, and we did not leave until they started closing the gates!! For Ron, the best part of the day was spent at the Saturn launch facility, looking at the early days of the space race. The size of everything and all the equipment was amazing. For me, it was the Space Shuttle display with Atlantis as the center of the exhibit. The memorials for the Challenger and Endeavor tragedies were especially moving.
There were quite a few groups of school kids going through the exhibits. When we went to the Mission to Mars exhibit, it began to make sense. NASA has a schedule to put people on Mars beginning in the 2030s. They figured out that the personnel needed for that timeframe would be today’s 5th graders - so they have active programs to get that age group involved. One NASA guide even told me that they talk to local schools and will even send out the NASA buses to pick up interested kid’s tour groups. Very cool. (I’m sure Ron wishes he was one of those 5th graders…)
We learned that the scheduled launch we are waiting to see will be a Military one so the closest we can get is around 5 miles. We figure we will have a fine view from our mooring ball. In the meantime, there is work to get done on the boat - plus laundry to do and a grocery store run to make. I have made plans to fly to California next week to visit with kids and grandkids for Christmas. I hope everyone gets to spend the holidays with people they love and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Karen.