Salt and Space

Labor Day weekend 2010

Saturday: Underground Salt Museum
First we watched a safety video about how important it was to wear your hard hat and carry your respiratory at all times, and what to do in case of an emergency, like a fire.

Then on to get our gear. Future miners:
To travel 650 feet down, you must take an elevator, or hoist, that is very noisy and completely dark. It's about a 1-2 minute ride, and during the ride, Zach asked, "we'll live, right?" Luckily we did! In the mine, we heard a little about how the salt mine was found, and had a brief geology lesson. Then off to explore. We saw the machines used by the miners long ago and also a little bit of what is stored in the Underground Vaults and Storage:
A tram ride took us in dark tunnels and told us more about the history of the salt mine and how it is mined today. The boys said their favorite part was the train ride.

At the end we got to pick out some salt to take home!
Sunday: Hutchinson Zoo & Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center

We had a couple of hours before the Cosmosphere opened, so we went to the Hutchinson Zoo. It was free, and it featured mostly native animals to this area.

We fed the fish and turtles...

Acted like groundhogs...
And looked across the river to see what we could see...
We made a brief stop at the park, where we met up with Oma. After lunch we headed to the Cosmosphere. We watched an IMAX movie - Hubble - about the Hubble telescope. Adam was intrigued...Zach, not so much. After the movie we visited the museum. Zach and I zipped through all the exhibits in record time.

This is Zach in the White Room...not to be confused with the White House. Don't ask me what is significant about the White Room, we were moving so fast, I couldn't read anything.
"Houston, we have a problem." (boy, do we ever!)
Next: Dr. Goddard's Lab. Blowing stuff up? Using chemicals to start fires? Loud explosions? Yeah, the boys were into that. Adam even answered a few questions when the instructor asked the audience.

Zach was ready to go after that. Since Oma had driven herself, we had an extra car. Zach, Oma and I headed home. Adam and Scott stayed to watch the Planetarium show.