STS trip

[gfish]

Since I'm still unemployed, and my parents were going to drive out to DC to visit my brother anyway, I've decided to fly out on May 6 and join them. And then we're going to drive down to Florida to see the STS-132 launch. (Maybe with a VIP pass? We're on the waiting list.) Not many Shuttle launches left, so I'm happy to finally have an opportunity to see one. My mom will then fly home from New Orleans, and my dad and I will drive a not-particularly direct path home (Spokane, that is), probably stopping to see aunts in Texas and a cousin in North Dakota. This will be the first time any of us have driven across the country, or done anything together on the east coast, so I'm pretty excited about it.

I'm looking for input on what we should make sure to see along the way. Right now I don't have too many goals: Colonial Williamsburg, Kittyhawk, the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History in Albuquerque. If you read this blog, you should have a pretty good idea what I'd be interested in. (And for these purposes my dad can be approximated as a 30 year older version of me.) Ideas?

Comments

[hpapillon.livejournal.com]

I love the outer banks with aching passion but it's been a while since I've been there and most of the things that matter to me there probably wouldn't be of much interest. :)

There is a little aviation museum there, but if you go all the way out to the islands just to go up Kill Devil Hill you might feel a bit let down. If you are interested in kites or hang-gliding, go to Jockey's Ridge while you're there. (It's also nice just to look at, but - hang gliding school!)

There's a couple little museums down the islands towards Ocracoke but again, long drive for not much return, unless you really, really like gingerbread. (No, that's not a museum, that's a bakery, and that IS why we drive down there.) And some wild horses.

For just plain driving notes, driving through Kentucky is usually scenic IMO.

There's some more space stuff in Huntsville, Alabama, where we got sent on field trips. Chattanooga has a very nice aquarium. Knoxville (well, Oak Ridge) has nuclear power and the dead body farm but I'm not sure if visitors are allowed to see those.

If you go to Memphis, you can meet the woman thrown out of her home to make a civil rights museum...

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Oak Ridge has both the original Y-12 reactor (but I think you have to arrange in advance to see that), and the Atomic Energy Museum (that you don't, it's outside the main research facility).

Better wild horses up on Chincoteague Island north of Norfolk, but that might be out of the way.

Also on I-40 (or just off it): Biltmore House, George Vanderbildt's summer home (365 rooms, four kitchens, a bowling alley, and a 3/4 Olympic pool) set up as a museum with among other things Napoleon's chess set. The Parthenon in Nashville, a replica of the one in Greece. Just beyond the western end of I-40 is Mojave, home of many wild and wonderful aircraft and space ships. (Dunno about tours, but they're there; there's also an awesome wind farm atop the ridge west of Mojave.)

Oh, and getting into Albuquirky on 40, when you come off the Sandia plateau and into ABQ proper? There's a big freakin' hill, that says TRUCKS 35. They MEAN IT. Cars can go faster, but don't push it; when we did it we saw a semi go by with his brakes ON FIRE. (We did not, thankfully, find him in a heap at the bottom or up one of the runaway ramps.)

Also, definitely recommend taking the southern route across the Rockies; even this late you may find inclement weather in the passes on 70, 80, or 90. (Cliff Mass says the passes are supposed to get dumped on this weekend, maybe even as we speak.) Donner Pass (I-80) is LEGENDARY for this.

And the drive through the Smokies will make up for missing Kentucky. OTOH? I hope your suspension is good, because last I checked, 40 through Arkansas is segmented concrete. BUMPadaBUMPadaBUMPadaBUMPada... Only way to fix is plow up the road and start over; even fresh asphalt over top will develop cracks in a year or two. But the Ozarks are pretty too...