Tom and I arrived back from our trip to Orlando and Mexico on Tuesday. It was a wonderful trip full of adventure, surprise, beauty, and discovery. Before heading to the Yucatan we stopped in Orlando to fulfill one of Tom’s dream of watching a space shuttle launch. We were watching the weather the entire week before hoping that things would be fair enough to allow the launch to go as scheduled. It was forecasted to be raining with thunderstorms but on the day of the launch it was beautiful and sunny and everything went as planned. We spent the morning before at the Kennedy Space Center, touring the various buildings, observing old rockets and shuttles, and learning more about the history of the space program. At 2:00 we bussed out to the site where we would watch the shuttle, we were about 8 miles away with a clear view. There were tons of people lined up along the causeway to watch- eating hot dogs, drinking sodas, and setting up their cameras and video cameras to document the launch. It was fun to be a part of such an excited group. Tom felt right at home with his fellow space junkies. As we waited reports of the crews progress was sounded over the loud speakers, and Tom did his best to decipher all of the acronyms. We had visited the Houston space center in March, and then saw another historic controls center earlier that day at Kennedy, which gave us great material to imagine the hustle and bustle that must be taking place amongst the control men. When the time arrived the whole crowd joined the speakers in a count down from 10. Then we all watched as plumbs of smoke billowed out from under the launch and then rising our of it this huge shaft of fire that propelled the shuttle into the air. From out distance the sounds were mainly a moderate grumble at first, but by the time the shuttle was a ways in the air the original explosions reached our ears and the sound was terrific. You could feel the deep bass rumbling in your chest- even over all the cheering from the crowd. The shuttle left a cloud behind itself and luckily the sky was clear enough that we were able to follow its path for quite a longs ways, and were even able to see the first stage drop off. It was a spectacular site. I came a way feeling awed at man’s ability to create, as well as inspired to challenge myself to learn and study more.

This shot is taken from the Kennedy Space center where they have the count down clock. Our view was actually a bit better because we didn’t have any bushes in the way. 

Here you can see the clouds created from the shuttle.

On Sunday after church we visited the Orlando Temple Grounds. It is a beautiful and very large temple.