Saturday, October 20, 2001
Monte Sano State Park, Huntsville, AL - Oct 18-20
After climbing a few hundred feet on a curvy road made more narrow by construction in one lane, we arrived at this large, nicely wooded cg, to find the office closed for lunch -- fortunate, since we got to choose our site rather than having them assign us one. None of the sites are "bad", but we picked one secluded from the clump of assigned campers. Heading our "to see" list was the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, which highlights our nation's achievements in space exploration. Included was an IMAX film on a dome screen -- quite impressive (as opposed to 3D, mentioned in our last tripnews). Also impressive was a mock-up of one module of the space station, which gave a good feel for the closeness & complexity of the layout. We got to see actual sleeping, bathroom, kitchen & science "modules". There were numerous hands-on exhibits, collections of various rockets & missiles, and a lot about the history of the space program in Huntsville. Fun, too, was "Mars Mission", a simulated Mars excursion and a "Mars" rock-climbing wall. Unfortunately, the bus tour of Marshall Space Flight Center to see actual construction of the Space Station was canceled for security reasons. On display outside on the grounds were a Saturn V rocket, a Space Shuttle and many other NASA rockets. This was a wonderful place, one which we'd like to return to again -- especially if we could also take the bus tour. For anyone saving campground info on our locations, there is an RV park connected with the Space Center, which is quite inexpensive & very nice. Reservations are a must. We would pick it over the SP in the future.Also in Huntsville we visited the historic downtown & strolled around a bit. Of note was Harrison Brothers Hardware Store, AL's oldest hardware store, which now sells mostly things you "can't live without".
# posted by Doug and Willie @ 6:42 PM 
