Written on October 18, 2026. Covers my visit to KSC.
After Artemis 2 launched on schedule on Wednesday, we had a couple extra days at the Cape, which we decided to use for a 2 day trip to the KSC visitor complex.
Day 1
Day 1 was spent on the main grounds, exploring the many exhibits on offer. There's the rocket garden, with historical rockets from Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo, as well as the Gateway building, which has a Falcon 9 booster, Cargo Dragon Capsule, and the Orion EFT-1 Capsule.
One of the other buildings had a replica of mission control from the Mercury era, but the coolest thing at the main complex had to be Space Shuttle Atlantis. Before you can see the shuttle itself, there is a full size tank and booster outside of the building, visible all around the complex.
Once inside, you watch a short film on the history of the program, before entering another room dedicated to Atlantis, and when the experience finishes, the main wall opens up revealing the shuttle.
Inside with the shuttle is an RS-25 main engine, a replica of Hubble, a mini-ISS playground, and exhibits for Artemis and more. The coolest thing in this building other than the shuttle is the shuttle simulator, a full size payload bay where you get shaken and tipped around simulating the movement of the real shuttle throughout flight.
Day 2
We had less time on day 2, but we went out on the KSC bus tour. You drive by the SpaceX Gigabay, which will help assemble and manage the most powerful rocket ever flown, the VAB, which serviced Saturn V, Shuttle, and now SLS, and go out to the crawlerway which luckily had the Artemis 2 crawler still there, right next to the visitor area.
The bus tour finishes out at the Saturn V center, where one of 3 remaining Saturn V rockets lives. It also has a replica crew gantry, a theater, and artifact vault containing prototype and flight apollo suits, moon rocks, flight artifacts, and the flown Apollo 14 Capsule "Kitty Hawk".
The KSC is a great visit, and I do recommend it for anyone in this area of Florida.
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