Blast off at Cape Canaveral!

On Friday, April 8th, we were thrilled when our visit to the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral coincided with the launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and its Dragon spacecraft. We spent the morning touring the space center and then decided to stay for the launch, scheduled for 4:43 p.m. The owners of the RV park where we were staying in Titusville had told us we could easily see the launch from the park across the street from us, however, once out at the Space Center, it was hard to resist the lure of actually being there when the rocket blasted off into space. Fortunately, the Center offered free kennels for pets and we were able to leave the boys in jail, i.e. the kennel, whilst we visited the Center and attended the launch. We did stop by in the early afternoon and walked the boys and reassured them that we would return... several hours later. It took us about 4 hours of waiting in line and on the bleachers to see the launch, but oh my! It was very exciting to see a rocket launch into space in person (vs. TV)! We subsequently learned that the Falcon rocket separated from the Dragon space craft and successfully landed on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean and that the Dragon docked onto the International Space Station. Woohoo! We're sure our presence and cheers (along with thousands of others) contributed to the mission's successful launch.

We returned to Titusville, a delightful little town on the Indian River with Merritt Island and Cape Canaveral to the east, quite pleased with a memorable day. As we departed the next morning, we drove to the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge and stopped at the Manatee Observation deck and were rewarded with seeing at least 15 - 20 manatees in the water. We also saw at least two roseate spoonbills flying by, too. It was icing on the cake to our visit to the Space Coast of Florida.

Next stop was at a nice county park in the 'burbs' of Jacksonville where stayed 3 nights in order to visit an old friend from Italy -- Carol Lucius and her boyfriend Jan Pozin. We also had an appointment to get our satellite TV dish repaired. We had a great visit with Carol and Jan on Sunday - perfect weather as we reminisced about our time together in Aviano, Italy and caught up with current events over wine and snacks outside our RV. On Monday, we inadvertently saw much more of Jacksonville, including the downtown area, on our way to our RV fix-it appointment. Unfortunately, the company was unable to fix our satellite dish, but we managed to return to park on a much less circuitous route.

We then headed to the Fort Clinch State Park on Amelia Island, which involved a very short ride on a ferry boat across the St. Johns River. The ferry was much smaller than Washington State ferries, but fun to say we did it. The state park on Amelia Island is adjacent to Fernandina Beach and near its Victorian, historic downtown area. We meandered around the historic area of Fernandina Beach on our last full day at Fort Clinch, enjoying the architecture of the downtown and the old homes. We also ate an excellent seafood lunch of shrimp and grits - yum! A wonderful way to say 'farewell' to Florida.

View of Cape Canaveral from Titusville, FL