Monday 3 June 2013

Cheesy Museums

30th May

One thing that has often surprised us as we tour, is the cheesy nature of many exhibitions. It's true to say that many otherwise serious museums have this style which may be safely described as Americana kitsch. Frankly, we love it. So much more attainable and approachable than the alternative of glowing digitalism! We quickly got into the mood, and had a hilarious time at the New Mexico Museum of Space History, in Alamogordooooo.



We started sensibly enough. The binoculars give a view over much of the valley, across to the mountains and the White Sands. To the North is the Trinity site; the location for the first nuclear explosion on Earth. Oppenheimer's deadly toy. To the South, is the vast expanse of the White Sands Missile Range, including the Space Harbor where the Shuttle (Columbia?? Discovery?) landed once, back in the 1980s. The museum pays homage to all of those astronauts as well as cosmonauts who have gone where no man has gone before..... okay, at this point we started getting a bit silly.

With apologies to one of the most incredible people ever - Herr Oberth, the father of rocketry, inspired as a teenager by Jules Verne - we had a lot of fun. In the end we were laughing so much we couldn't hold the camera steady...












It's very small, but the writing next to the button says 'DUMP'


So I tried it - in this Skylab toilet from the 1970s





A great place. I'll never forget our visit! I had a bonus in the next-door planetarium/iMax ;  a film of the Hubble telescope - all across the domed roof of the planetarium. Gorgeous!

About 2pm, we left for White Sands, and the junction I25 at Las Cruces.



3 comments:

Unknown said...

Auwh looks fun! I actually zoomed in to make sure it said dump. I tried doing the same on your shirt but it went blurry. So what does it say?

writecodesign said...

I AM YOUR FATHER
:)

Unknown said...

Looks epic guys! You both look very happy!