There's a long list of them - the things that spun off from the NASA Space Program and benefited mankind. For a full list of some of them, check out the following link.
Another list can be found here: link
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Monday, June 27, 2011
Camping in the Poconos
Its been years since I last went camping...
This past weekend I took my 10$ second-hand tent, aging second-hand car and a brand new sleeping bag and headed up to the Poconos Mountains. I've been to the Poconos before but under totally different weather conditions. This is me snowboarding down Shawnee Mountain Check-it-out! last winter. This time the Poconos was lush with greenery everywhere!
It's really close to home - just a 1hr 20 minute drive from Somerset, NJ. We got stuck on the I-80 West for about an hour waiting for the police to clear a horrible accident. Someone on a speedbike had crashed and the bike didn't look like a bike anymore...hope their ok.
We were the first of our 9-person group to reach the campsite. The short talk with the receptionist of seeing black bears if your very very lucky set my blood boiling. The thrill was unbelievable. Now I know what that nutcase on "Grizzly Man" was going through :). Shooting ahead in time, I unfortunately didn't see any bears. Black bears are smaller and less aggressive than the grizzly monsters in "Grizzly Man". A more promising vantage point to see the bears was from our raft in the Delaware river the next day. The people at Adventure Sports told us people see them all the time in the corn fields and on the shore drinking from the river. Unfortunately, again I didnt see any.
Anyway, we setup my 10$ tent which I thought was fine but caught lots of criticism from my tent sharer :). It was quite smaller than illustrated on the side of the carrying case. The rest of the group arrived later and I helped them setup their 7-person tent.
After that, we barbecued, lit a campfire, drank tea, setup a hookah, laughed a load and tried to see celestial bodies with my telescope...
The next day we went rafting and canoeing on the high-tide Delaware river. Two of our group got stranded on an island and lost their canoe. The current pushed them into the submerged trees off an island and they were forced to abandon ship. They later recovered it and met us as we were calling for help from a lifeguard's mobile phone :).
Here's some pix:
The temperature dropped a handful into the night.
Definitely an experience worth repeating over and over again. I look forward to going in the coming weeks...
This past weekend I took my 10$ second-hand tent, aging second-hand car and a brand new sleeping bag and headed up to the Poconos Mountains. I've been to the Poconos before but under totally different weather conditions. This is me snowboarding down Shawnee Mountain Check-it-out! last winter. This time the Poconos was lush with greenery everywhere!
It's really close to home - just a 1hr 20 minute drive from Somerset, NJ. We got stuck on the I-80 West for about an hour waiting for the police to clear a horrible accident. Someone on a speedbike had crashed and the bike didn't look like a bike anymore...hope their ok.
We were the first of our 9-person group to reach the campsite. The short talk with the receptionist of seeing black bears if your very very lucky set my blood boiling. The thrill was unbelievable. Now I know what that nutcase on "Grizzly Man" was going through :). Shooting ahead in time, I unfortunately didn't see any bears. Black bears are smaller and less aggressive than the grizzly monsters in "Grizzly Man". A more promising vantage point to see the bears was from our raft in the Delaware river the next day. The people at Adventure Sports told us people see them all the time in the corn fields and on the shore drinking from the river. Unfortunately, again I didnt see any.
Anyway, we setup my 10$ tent which I thought was fine but caught lots of criticism from my tent sharer :). It was quite smaller than illustrated on the side of the carrying case. The rest of the group arrived later and I helped them setup their 7-person tent.
After that, we barbecued, lit a campfire, drank tea, setup a hookah, laughed a load and tried to see celestial bodies with my telescope...
The next day we went rafting and canoeing on the high-tide Delaware river. Two of our group got stranded on an island and lost their canoe. The current pushed them into the submerged trees off an island and they were forced to abandon ship. They later recovered it and met us as we were calling for help from a lifeguard's mobile phone :).
Here's some pix:
The temperature dropped a handful into the night.
Definitely an experience worth repeating over and over again. I look forward to going in the coming weeks...
Celestron Nexstar 6SE
So I recently upgraded my Celestron powerseeker to a Celestron Nexstar 6SE. My heart was pounding and mind twirling as I could imagine the scenes this new telescope would reveal to me.
I took it out this past weekend for a trial in the Poconos Mountains. Unfortunately I only had one clear night and I was surrounded by trees so I was only able to see a bunch of stars and nothing more.
Last week before going camping I did manage to get some shots of the moon on a partial cloudy night.
These are much more detailed than the previous images I took using the powerseeker. Click on them to get a full-sized view.
I took it out this past weekend for a trial in the Poconos Mountains. Unfortunately I only had one clear night and I was surrounded by trees so I was only able to see a bunch of stars and nothing more.
Last week before going camping I did manage to get some shots of the moon on a partial cloudy night.
These are much more detailed than the previous images I took using the powerseeker. Click on them to get a full-sized view.
Last Launch - July 8th
The space shuttle program is ending :(. Shuttle Atlantis will do the honor of blasting off from Cape Canaveral on July 8th. There will be a live tweetup with a number of live video streams covering the event from a number of perspectives. Here's a list of the tweetups so far:
The @NASA sponsored @NASATweetup held at the press site:
@NASATweetup/sts-135-launch
Space View Park Tweetup:
@SVPTweetup
NASA Causeway:
@CausewayTweetup/sts135-causewaytweetup
reference: [ref]
Im seriously thinking of going to Florida to witness the last launch. I hope I can make it. The only thing im scared of is if they postpone the launch (which happens all the time) then I will have flown down there for no reason :S. We'll just have to wait and see.
The @NASA sponsored @NASATweetup held at the press site:
@NASATweetup/sts-135-launch
Space View Park Tweetup:
@SVPTweetup
NASA Causeway:
@CausewayTweetup/sts135-causewaytweetup
reference: [ref]
Im seriously thinking of going to Florida to witness the last launch. I hope I can make it. The only thing im scared of is if they postpone the launch (which happens all the time) then I will have flown down there for no reason :S. We'll just have to wait and see.
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