Day 293 – Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex
Melbourne to Space Center and back to Miami
Today, we left our distant family’s home in the heart of Melbourne. After sleeping in the dorm rooms for the last few nights, it was amazing to have a proper night’s rest, on a proper mattress.
After less than an hour of driving, we arrived at the Kennedy Space Centre Visitor Complex car park. Parking costs $10 USD / $14.78 AUD per car. It was actually school holidays when we went, so there was a massive line to get in. We bought our tickets from the electronic ticket machines, which cost us $60.99 USD / $90.12 AUD per person.
If you look online, the tickets are only $57 USD per person, but you have to include the tax (which doesn’t seem linear, for example, tax for one ticket is $4.38 USD, but for two is $8.37 USD), and there is even an additional “Convenience Fee” ($5.60 USD) for every transaction regardless of how many ticket you buy. It’s actually cheaper to buy the tickets at the site by a few dollars.
Honestly, the complex was over our budget, but we didn’t care. It was well worth the money. Furthermore, if we had planned it out better, we would have gotten the 2 day admission pass (base ticket price is $75 USD / $110.87 AUD plus all taxes), because there is so much to do here.
If you can, try to organise your trip around a rocket launch. We missed an unmanned SpaceX rocket by one week, which I was semi bummed about. If it was a manned rocket, we would have definitely extended our stay. Check the official website for launch schedule, found here.
That being said, our family friends said they just watch the launches from a park or something back in Melbourne.
Visitor Centre
Our first point of call was the visitor centre, where the staff gave us maps and provided us with a daily schedule. We were advised to do the main 3 buildings, and 1 IMAX movie out of the 14 available. We then lined up, and went through a bag search before entering the site.
Heroes & Legends
Our first building was the Heroes and Legends building, which includes 3D glasses for the start of the presentation. The building celebrates everything related to aviation, from the Wright brothers to the astronauts of today. Its done so well.
Rocket Garden
As we exited Heroes and Legends, we ended up in the Rocket Garden. We could see the rockets from the car park. They are a little hard to hide. On display are some rockets from the earlier days of space exploration.
Absolutely massive!
Bus Tour
After the garden, we walked past the ⅛ scale mural of the International Space Centre and NASA central to the Bus tour line. Here we had to wait around 15 minutes until we were on a bus.
The bus tour was a definite highlight. The tour leaves the Visitor Complex, and drives into an operational space port! The bus driver gives us rolling commentary in between informative videos. It was very entertaining and educational at the same time, and it was a freaking space port!
Everything about it was awesome!
This building is massive. That flag measures 63×33 metres
The bus does a loop around the massive Vehicle Assembly Building (where they make rockets), to a few active launch sites that are performed in partnership with Boeing and SpaceX.
Apollo / Saturn V Centre
The bus dropped us off at the Apollo / Saturn V Centre. Here we had to wait outside until the next presentation was ready. It was well worth the wait, as we were able to watch the launch countdown for Apollo 8 from the Firing Room. It was incredible.
After leaving the Firing Room, we were greeted by a massive Saturn V rocket. Its size is just outstanding. The Saturn V rockets were used in the Apollo missions.
Moon Rover
After taking in the massive rocket and all the surrounding exhibits, we went to the Lunar Theatre, for a presentation showing the moon landing. Again….Epic.
We then had to take a bus back to the Visitor Complex, which took around 30 minutes, including waiting for the bus to arrive.
Once back at the complex we had lunch at the food court.
As we were walking towards the Atlantis building, my wife, went to the bathroom to wash her hands.
As I was waiting outside, there was one crack of thunder, and then after 10 seconds, a tropical downpour came out of nowhere. It was solid lightning and rain all around. We were stranded under a sheltered path. Unfortunately, it didn’t lead anywhere useful. We tried to wait it out, as lighting was attracted to the tall metal rockets around us. However, the rain only intensified and came in at a 60 degree angle, drenching us and everyone else under the shelter. We risked a lightning strike and ran towards the Atlantis building.
Inside, we attempted to dry ourselves in the toilets but we spent the rest of the day drenched. The rain and lightning didn’t stop for at least 30 minutes.
Space Shuttle Atlantis
The Atlantis building, starts with another amazing presentation detailing the design of the reusable space ship. At the end, the wall opens to reveal an actual Atlantis Shuttle. Once again amazing.
This is an actual Atlantis Shuttle The 3 main engines generates over 37 million horse power
The building also has information about the International Space Centre and a Space Shuttle Launch Experience similar to a theme park ride, which is a must.
IMAX Cinemas
We ended up only getting to see one film, which was Touch the Stars. This was a 3D presentation for around 40 minutes. All the presentations are of an amazing quality.
It was truly an amazing experience to visit the Kennedy Space Centre and there was so much we missed out on. But I think, we managed to see all the major attractions.
Drive back to Miami
The drive back to Miami, wasn’t too bad. It was a 3 hour journey. We stopped for some dinner along the way and to fill up our ride.
I also found out that you must prepay the petrol, even if you want do a full tank. The staff member charges an amount, which you have to guess. I was way over. When I went to see the staff member, he refunded the excess money back. I’m don’t think, if I had to go back into the store to get the refund, but it’s better to be safe.
Since we wanted a place with parking close to the airport, we stayed at the Holiday Inn Miami. It was really nice, with excellent service. But this convenience came at a price of over $100 AUD a night.
The hotel was nice, and had plenty of space in the hotel rooms. The one odd thing, was the rooms were only lit by lamps. There was no lights on the ceiling.