Arriving at Alamogordo
The X Prize week was already in progress when we arrived Thursday afternoon. The first event was an education day at the New Mexico Museum of Space History in Alamogordo, seen here up on the hill through the car window. We left Los Lunas mad early, so we could get to Alamogordo in time to help with the first big event--a Space Camp sleepover at the museum.
John P Stapp Air and Space Park
The New Mexico Museum of Space History has a great rocket garden in front of it. The view from the museum over the valley, with White Sands in the distance is amazing. We passed on staying with the kids at the sleepover (as it involved sleeping on the floor of a gym), and drove up to Cloudcroft to a peaceful resort in the mountains for the night (The Lodge--very nice, but expensive).
A and A at Cloudcroft Sequence
Ariel and Andrew photographing the gigantic cool Permian sedimentary sequence by the road in a ravine (the ravine being an erosional feature, I presume) between Cloudcroft and Alamogordo. From this point, I think you can see nearly 300 meters of exposed Permian limestone beds (at least I think it was Limestone), as the canyon is at least 150 meters deep where they are standing on the edge, and to the right it goes at least 150 meters above the level of the road on this side of the canyon. The sign at this turnout or the next one claimed that the gypsum sand that makes up White Sands eroded out of these Permian deposits.
Ariel with Tarantula
Right after the Friday Press conference during the X-Prize educational event at the New Mexico Museum of Space History, we rescued a beautiful gigantic Tarantula that was apparently trying to go into the museum. At the point when I first saw it, it had crawled across at least one wide road and 75 feet of paved courtyard--that's where the nearest dirt area was. Totally cool! We took it out to a desert "garden" area near where the model rocket people were firing off their rockets.
Andrew and Ariel and SpaceShipOne
On Sunday, Ariel and Andrew got Press Passes, thanks to our friend Barb Sprungman (education coordinator for the events of this week), and we got in before the public did to the X-Cup event at the Las Cruces Airport. Here Ariel and Andrew are in front of Burt Rutan's SpaceShip One, taking pictures of John Carmak's Armaadillo entry. John is a video game person, and a hero of Andrew's.
Andrew and Ariel at X Prize event
One of the few clear shots I've ever gotten of Andrew's face. He's worse than Ariel about allowing photos to be taken of him, if you believe that. The giant inflatable Mars and Earth globes in the back ground were torn apart by the sudden windstorm that hit the area less than an hour after the public event was over. No injuries that I heard of, but there was a lot of damage caused by the wind.