3...2....1....

Although NASA has failed to launch now 5 times in a row, our journey has blasted off. A quick drive across the state to Kennedy Space Center found us on our first, itchy, adventure. Canaveral National Seashore, the north part of Kennedy Space Center turned national park has "back country" camping on private islands. Sounded nice. Got a site, rented a canoe and loaded up. Paddled 1.6 miles to the island against an incoming storm. Got to the island, set up the tent and got the hell in because the rain was a comin'. 1 shesbesh (backgammon) win for Jacob, and a half bottle of wine, later the rain stopped and it was time to explore. The island was great, good views all around, nice trees, picnic table, tiny little crabs, its was amazing.... enter Sandflies. Sandflies, if you have never experienced them, are millimeter sized flies that congregate in the millions?? and bite leaving an itching red bump for approximately a week or more. I've heard of how bad black flies in Maine, and the eighth plague of locusts are/were, but tack sandflies of florida on there too. Moses would have been proud of this one. Anyways, through the itching and biting, we found some manatees swimming by and a ton of beautiful birds. Sleep was pretty non existent as we learned that we were not on a private island. Our other guest was not Gilligan, the skipper, or Mary Ann.... it was a raccoon. I didnt know they were island dwellers, but things are a little different here in florida. Thank you to the sandflies (the only time ill ever do that) for keeping us awake, because the raccoon ripped into my dry sack for our food and ended up dropping it off the table and dragging it almost to the water. He may have been after the food inside or any one of the following: my camera, my cell phone, the car keys. After staying awake to watch the sunrise, the raccoon came back 3 times, we were off to NASA. The 45 minute paddle to the island against the storm turned to a beautiful calm paddle back with eagles and a beautiful morning in store. NASA was really cool, one of the best museums I've been to. The launch got canceled that day, the storm that we paddled through had lightening hit near the shuttle a bunch. We did go on the bus tour, saw the Saturn V rocket, the most powerful machine ever produced. Helen is so strong that she could hold it up (see the video). We were artificially launched to the moon in a simulator, rode in the moon rover, and relived the moon landing. We even got a chance to see the modules being prepared for the international space station. Oh... and we found the coolest halloween costume yet. It was a great start to the journey, real blast off is this thursday night. Here are some highlights of the trip so far.