Sunday, October 9, 2011
Still raining. But the locals are welcoming it.
The rest area was quite busy overnight, but it was a place to get off the road.
We had breakfast before leaving, and we didn't rush right out because we only had about 60 miles to go. We did check out an RV parts store but it wasn't open, and then stopped at the local Walmart. Then off to the Cosmosphere.
We had breakfast before leaving, and we didn't rush right out because we only had about 60 miles to go. We did check out an RV parts store but it wasn't open, and then stopped at the local Walmart. Then off to the Cosmosphere.
We had to choose which IMax film we wanted to see, and chose the one about chasing Tornadoes. We had a structured agenda for the day, with different shows each hour. So we had a little time before the first show, and went downstairs to the museum. Much more impressive than we had expected. We were told the Cosmosphere is second only to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. The museum is a walk through time in the space race, starting with quite a bit of information from Germany, then Russia and the US. We interrupted our tour of the museum to go see the IMax, then had 15 minutes to browse in the store before going to see Dr. Goddard's Lab. It is a live demo, and was great. Had some excellent demos, with several rather loud explosions. Much better than Wilma had expected.
Then we had 15 minutes before going to the Planetarium show. After that show, we went back to the museum, and were maybe three quarters of the way through it when they announced closing in 10 minutes. They are only open 12-5 on Sunday, and it wasn't quite enough time to do the whole thing. We kind of raced through the end of it and finally found an exit to get back upstairs. There were lots of displays throughout the building. Barney especially liked the SR71 Blackbird (world's fastest spy plane) hanging just inside the entrance. His dad had worked on that project many years ago. We also saw Sputnik, several lunar rovers, Mars explorers, and on and on. It is a great museum, and we were really glad we found out about it while we could get to it.
Then we had 15 minutes before going to the Planetarium show. After that show, we went back to the museum, and were maybe three quarters of the way through it when they announced closing in 10 minutes. They are only open 12-5 on Sunday, and it wasn't quite enough time to do the whole thing. We kind of raced through the end of it and finally found an exit to get back upstairs. There were lots of displays throughout the building. Barney especially liked the SR71 Blackbird (world's fastest spy plane) hanging just inside the entrance. His dad had worked on that project many years ago. We also saw Sputnik, several lunar rovers, Mars explorers, and on and on. It is a great museum, and we were really glad we found out about it while we could get to it.
It was still raining, and we were hungry, so found a Taco Bueno for our dinner.
We thought we would try to find Wilma's brother near Wichita and maybe spend the night in his driveway, but with total darkness and still raining pretty heavy, we didn't want to go on, so found a Walmart and curled up for the night.
More of our adventures tomorrow.
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