posted 04-10-2007 01:57 PM               

Any information would be greatly appreciated. I have been a cSer for a few years now, so if this has been covered before then I apologise.

posted 04-10-2007 03:22 PM               

• The NASA (tram) tour, included with admission, includes visits to the Historic Mission Control, current Mission Control and the Space Vehicle Mock-Up Facility. Access is limited to viewing galleys.

• The 4.5 hour Level Nine Tour, which is limited to only 12 people per day and can be reserved in advance for a ticket price of $80 (which includes the regular admission to SCH), includes visits to both mission controls, the Space Vehicle Mock-Up Facility, the Space Environment Simulation Lab and the Neutral Buoyancy Lab. The tour also includes lunch inside one of the employee cafeterias, where you might spot an astronaut or two.

posted 04-12-2007 03:56 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by mjanovec:
For the Historic Mission Control, what is the level of access for both tours? Is it limited to a viewing galley for both tours...or does the Level Nine Tour let you walk among the consoles?

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posted 04-16-2007 12:13 PM               

Regards

posted 04-16-2007 07:32 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by OV-105:
Didn't they just change that MOCR over for the ISS last year?

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posted 04-27-2007 12:52 AM            

Once back at Space Center Houston, as I said before, it was just a bunch of kids running around with no plans. Not much to look at that was real honest to goodness space artifacts. They had one LARGE room with spacesuits and other items with names besides each one making you believe that this person had something to do with that item. When reading further you discover that the astronaut’s who’s name is next to that item may have worn or used an item similar to the item that you were looking at. Again, no real honest to goodness flown space artifacts, just a large room with a lot of wasted space. To help make this story short, just about every room was geared towards a child under 10 years of age and very little for an adult.

I had been to Space Center Houston twice before in years past and I knew that Apollo 17, Gemini 5, and MA-9 were in that building somewhere but they had all been moved since my last visit. I was ready to cut to the chase so I went to the information desk and asked a young man about college age on where I could find the Apollo 17 Command Module. His reply was that Apollo 17 was located at the Rocket Park in the building with the large rocket (meaning the Saturn V). When I told him that it wasn’t there he tried to tell me that it was. Around and around that conversation went until I got fed up with him and said….”Your talking about the Saturn V, the three stage rocket with seven and a half million pounds of thrust at launch that stands 363 feet tall, that took American astronauts to the moon in the late 60’s to early 70’s….NO IT'S NOT THERE!” I had his attention now! His next reply was….”Oh that little thing” making gestures with his hands like he was making a snow ball…I stopped him and said “YES that thing”! We finally made a connection! He told me that I would have to go through a movie theatre, or if I didn’t want to see the movie to go down the hallway behind the monkey bars that all the kids were climbing and screaming from. Doing as he said, sure enough after a few hours of seeing nothing, we had finally hit pay dirt. There was real honest to goodness flown space artifacts, Apollo 17, Gemini 5, MA-9, several moon rocks and other things to see.

So, to sum this all up, the tour of JSC was not worth it or for SCH to even bother to gas the tram up for. If you want to see JSC up close wait until they have an open house. I’ve been to two open houses and you see a whole lot more including Mission Control, the old Lunar Receiving Laboratory and more….from the inside not just the outside of the buildings.

As for Space Center Houston, it just a high price play ground to wear kids down so they will sleep good that night. Not much there for adults to see and do, and it’s sure not worth the $32 (with $4 off coupons) that we paid to get in, plus the $5 to park. The staff is not informed and don’t have a clue where things are. They all need to be retrained if they ever were to begin with. I would also suggest them to get rid of the head curator since all they really need are baby sitters to entertain the kids that are there. Yes, I was really disappointed in the place.

If you’re coming to the U.S. from another country to see America’s space program, go to KSC or to Huntsville, Alabama and you will not be disappointed. I would hate for anyone to make a long trip and be as disappointed as my wife and I were with JSC and SCH.

posted 05-26-2007 04:33 AM               

I would agree that if you are only going into the front area at JSC it is a bit grim, but man, the lecture followed by the museum areas are just great -

Cheers

Craig

Our experience there was fantastic and I can't rate it highly enough. There's partial write-up in the autograph shows threads from about September last year.

PS - thanks to Dave and Sharon for guest appearances ;-)

posted 05-26-2007 09:15 AM               

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Originally posted by SpaceDust:
We than proceeded to the front of the space center were we were told to look for a circle of tree on our left. These were the trees planted for the astronauts that had given their lives for the conquest of space. The problem here was that the trees were on our right and they lined the roadway and were not in a circle at all.

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Sorry for your bad experience at Space Center Houston!

I wanted to point out the the Memorial Grove of trees planted for astronauts is indeed a circle of trees on the left. The trees along the left of the roadway have been planted for individuals other than astronauts.

I suppose that, due to the shooting at JSC the day before, the route of the tram may have been temporarily altered and perhaps you did not go by the Memorial Grove.