almost articulate: May 2011

31 May 2011

[New post] #NASAtweetup Day 0: NASAroadtrip!

#NASAtweetup Day 0: NASAroadtrip!

lsell | Wed 27 April 2011 at 23:16 | Tags: adventures, fambly, geek, Kennedy Space Center, NASA, NASAtweetup, roadtrip!, sleep or lack thereof | Categories: my actual life, space | URL: http://wp.me/p1sIrg-5a

Well, as you may have guessed, from the proximity of my location in the last post to my destination, and there has been no report of my tragic death by car crash/explosion/alligator (pretty much the only thing that could have stopped me), I did make it to the NASA tweetup at Kennedy Space Center. Having left home (Philly-ish) just a little after 4am, we were safely around DC, into Virginia, and heading away from the traffic by the time rush hour hit, so we made really good time. It was roughly 1000 miles of this:

but I didn't particularly mind, as it's pretty, I've always liked roadtrips, and Daddy's good company. :)

We made a slight detour to stop in Charleston, South Carolina, to meet up with a tug from my Dad's company that was docked there, so he could get some of their paperwork and safety training updated. It was a nice little break from the car, and the crew was incredibly nice and hospitable.

I had half expected to spend that stop sitting in the car waiting for Dad to finish what he needed to do, so it was a very pleasant surprise to instead spend it in their cozy air-conditioned galley, chatting with a very silly and entertaining bunch of guys, full of rough-and-tumble charm (with varying degrees of "rough-and-tumble"), who I would happily hang out with again, with or without the pretense of Dad's work. I was honestly disappointed when we had to get back on the road, but we wanted to get to my aunt/uncle's before it got too late.

With about 2 hours there, and a few shorter stops throughout the trip for fuel (caffeine and gasoline) and potty breaks, we still made the whole trip in about 18 hours, arriving in Cocoa a little after 10pm.