Made it to Titusville Marina today. Our plan is to rent a car and drive to Kennedy Space Center tomorrow. Walked to town to check it out. We had been here for one of the shuttle launches. When we had come for the launch, we walked a good part of town including the marina so a lot looked familiar.
Rented the car from Enterprise, got the weekend rate. And a good deal it is, $20 for Saturday and Sunday, returning the car Monday morning. We walked to the car rental just to get out early. Were off by 9:15 and headed to the Space Center. I read that they now offer tours of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) so wanted to get in on that. We did the full blown tour. It was worth the $$. The orbiter Atlantis was in the VAB being prepared to go on display at the Space Center. Construction was underway to build a new building to house Atlantis.
And we finally saw alligators. We also saw bald eagles and gopher turtles. One of the bald eagle nests, there may be about 20 nests on the reserve, is said to weigh approximately 800 pounds and has been there for over 30 years. Amazing to see. Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1963 as an overlay of NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center. Consisting of 140,000 acres, the Refuge provides a wide variety of habitats: coastal dunes, saltwater estuaries and marshes, freshwater impoundments, scrub, pine flatwoods, and hardwood hammocks provide habitat for more than 1,500 species of plants and animals. We got to see a small part of this incredible area.
Watched a 3D IMAX on the Hubble Telescope and toured the other parts of the center.
Sunday, we reprovisioned and watched the Superbowl.
Monday, we returned the car and walked back to the marina. While we were fueling, we saw a manatee by the dock. It is unbelievable the scars on the backs of these animals. We are extra careful to watch for them.
Jacksonville is our next marina with a stop or 2 in-between.
We see dolphins along the way. It is still very shallow on both sides of the channel, 1-2 ft deep.
While driving the boat today, I had my iPAD in my hand just holding it down to my side. Don't know what happened, but I dropped it just right and it cracked the screen on the side with the button. Boohoo. It still works but will need to see about replacing the screen. What a pain.
The weather turned cloudy and dark before we reached our anchorage for the evening. As we were deciding where to drop the anchor, it got shallow and we churned up mud or something, not good.
Our anchorage was by Memorial bridge close to Daytona Beach.
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