The HabForum

Ok maybe its the warm weather but i have been feeling really nostalgic for camp the last few days so random ideas for threads have been popping into my head and since its the 25th anniversary i thought this might be a good one.

I was wondering what is the first memory everyone has of being at space camp. For me it was coming down the highway and seeing the Saturn 1 sticking up above the trees and everything else. Ofcourse this was 8 years before they built the standung Saturn V replica abd it was the talles thing around. When i saw that Apollo boilerplate and escape tower sticking up above everything else i knew i had arrived. This was especially comforting after 2 days in the back seat of a car with my little brother driving their from Virginia. Ofcourse the Saturn 1 stood out in my mind from pictures in the brochures as well as it was there in the movie as well. Pathfinder wasnt visible imediately and was less familiar to me keep in mind it had only been there about 2 years and i had watched alot of the movie.

Warm weather... I wish... I want spring...

My first memory was walking off the plane and someone wearing a USSRC shirt approaching me and asking me if I was going to Space Camp. (I have no idea how they picked me out). Then, I was brought into the infamous airport room where I read my book and looked at the pictures on the walls before another kid arrived and we took a van to camp.

Arriving at camp (in the dark) I remember seeing the rockets and Pathfinder all it up. I nearly melted in awe and excitement.

My first memory was on July 9, 2006. I was going to check in, but I got there early. I toured the museum and waited until I checked in. Only two guys on my team were very interested in space. Me, and my friend from south carolina. One kid only wanted to talk about ghosts, witches, and the apocalypse. I got hamesick on all the nights except the first night. I hope trhat the next year will be better. I won't have to deal with 50 people in one room. I only showered once, same with teeth brushing. I was pretty much the smartest guy in the whole session at that level. I think my day counselor wanted me to get right stuff. I coorected my night counselor. I was confused how the first mission dosent count, but you get what position you want, but the second mission gives you a random position. I also remember going on space shot, looking down on the redstone, and my russian friend yelling, "This is f*cking awesome!" I still talk with the kid from south carolina and the russian kid.

It's that special glazed look in your eye. They all know it and can tell a space nut immediately.

I remember going past and seeing the rockets from the distance. That was thrilling.

--des

SpaceCanada wrote:Warm weather... I wish... I want spring...

My first memory was walking off the plane and someone wearing a USSRC shirt approaching me and asking me if I was going to Space Camp. (I have no idea how they picked me out).

Arriving at camp (in the dark) I remember seeing the rockets and Pathfinder all it up. I nearly melted in awe and excitement.

My first memory was getting off the plane and seeing the counselor in a flightsuit. We then collected kids from other planes and went and got our luggage and took the bus to camp. The emergancy exit window kept opening everytime we hit a bump and set the alarm off. At camp the first thing I remember doing is getting off at the red gate and it being very hot (I went in August). We put our luggage in the Hab and went and got food. I was a day early so we watched movies and went to bed after.

I can't remember whether I saw the space mural in the Huntsville airport when I was coming in, or only when I was leaving, but I thought it was cool, whenever it was. I went to the ground transportation area and asked the guys at the desk whether I was in the right place to get the bus to Space Camp. They smiled and pointed it out. I got on and met two of my team members. The three of us got to camp, where I was impressed by the red gate and Pathfinder, and took some pics. We met Phil, our counselor, had lunch and hung out in the museum till registration time, where we met everyone else. Everyone was very cool, which really made it fun.

i live within driving distance (about 2 hours away) from camp so the first thing i saw was a billboard on the outside of town. i would watch for this billboard every year because each year it would be different. it was also my indication that i was getting close to my destination. as soon as you pass the billboard, you go around a turn and over a hill and the Saturn I comes into view for the first time (no standing Saturn V back then). i had visited the rocket center before so i don't know if that counts as a first memory. i guess my first memory is entering the Hab at check-in and seeing all the japanese and korean kids (it was international week my first session i attended).

I had (still probably have) relatives in Huntsville, so I visited the USSRC before. They used to have this repeating movie about Space Camp on these huge monitors. There weren't any adults in these pictures (not as cute I guess), but I still wanted to go. Even so I think the USSRC is an amazing museum. I went to the Houston Space Center and this is sad by comparison.

--des

I also remember walking onto the Space Camp campus in Florida when I was there in 1997. I begged and pleaded to be able to see inside the main building but in the end, all I got to see was the outside.

We were there to visit KSC down the road, and we didn't have much extra time, but my parents stopped in at Space Camp just so I could look around. Rather, they had a teenager begging and pleading them to stop, and they did, probably just to quiet me down for a few minutes.

i remember my first time at space camp.....it was july 2001. and me and my dad had just gotten off the plane and went to go and get our rental car and my luggage. when i saw that awsome mural/collage i knew i was home. on the way to our hotel me and my dad took a detor and drove by space camp. it was simply beautiful. words still cant describe it. the saturn 5 standing proud glowing. i had tears running down my face. i was a scrawny thirteen year old thirteen year old from rhode island and i knew i was home. i knew i would be able to talk about space and aviation and not look like a total loser. the next morning i went to mach 2 and came back a few weeks later for academy. and i love space camp. i found my self there.

SpaceCanada wrote:I also remember walking onto the Space Camp campus in Florida when I was there in 1997. I begged and pleaded to be able to see inside the main building but in the end, all I got to see was the outside.

We were there to visit KSC down the road, and we didn't have much extra time, but my parents stopped in at Space Camp just so I could look around. Rather, they had a teenager begging and pleading them to stop, and they did, probably just to quiet me down for a few minutes.

You didn't miss anything special. I've been there, and it never was anything comparable to Alabama.

I first went to camp in Titusville and my mother drove me down. I remember having to get my name corrected at the check in table. I always get nostalgic when I pass that old hab on the KSC tour.

I didn;t realise you went to the florida camp. It would be cool to get a few more people who went there would love to se any pictures you have from the Florida camp Benji. I had thought about going there my first year but went to huntsville instead. Almost wish i had gone to the florida camp since i still to this day havent been to KSC.

my first real good memory of space camp was getting out of the van and getting our luggage out of the back. this is only memorable because one of the kids had put his gear on the ground back by the airport and had set it down on a nest of red ants...or fire ants...or something like that. he had some candy in the backpack and those little buggers were tenacious.

If they were biting ants they would be fire ants otherwise just red ants neither really fun but id rather deal with red ants than fire ants.

last i remember was having an emergency landing in Nashville and having to wait with the other camp kids 3 hours before they got us on a flight to Huntsville
good times...goooood times

In 1999 ALL my flights home were cancelled due to weather. I wasn't flying as an unaccompanied minor, so it took me a while to figure out what to do in strange airports with no tickets. (The sirline people did help me out.) Space Camp even called my parents to tell them I was flying home on flights different from the ones I was supposed to, except, two of the flights they told my mum I was on also got cancelled and I was diverted to others. That freaked my mum out a bit. A lot. I made it home four hours late but at least I made it home. (I even boarded a plane headed for Hong Kong somewhere along the line... but I got off in a hurry.)

Ah yes... Space Camp stories...

My first memory from Space Camp is 20-25 April 1986 (can't believe I remember the dates off the top of my head!)

My parents and I stayed at the "Brand New" Marriott (I don't think it was even finished yet) the night before camp started, then dropped me off the next day. I was assigned to the Uranus (yep, planets then) team. Ugly brown visor and white T-shirt with Red cuffs/lettering. We all went to the "bubble" to drop off our luggage in our rooms in the basement, and then went around for a tour upstairs. The bubble at that time held all the simulators. I remember thinking how cool it was I was there and couldn't wait to fly my shuttle mission!

Anybody else remember sleeping in the basement of the bubble? I have to dig out my pics and post 'em. Good stuff!

Well though th bubble housing the original training center was before my time i've seen some pictures of the interior and exterior as well as some old video taken inside there. As for antone remembering sleeping in there well anyone who ever slept in the lower level of hab 2 has done so because the lower level rooms someone pointed out were the rooms that were under the original training cebter the bubble as it were. Tbe bubble was aprently built on a concrete slab that also served as the seiling i guess you could say for thosr basement rooms. Today hab 2 is built over that sot. I slept in one of those rooms my first year there in 91, The bubble today as someone poointed out is now the bubble down at the aviation challenge lake.

Oh yeah i forgot something. I also remember the red ringer t-shirts and ugly brown visors we stillhad them in 91, Though that year the brown visor was for the Teledyne Brown team still have mine check out the pictures under vintage space camp memorabeia there is a link there to the pictures.