last day at space camp

Last message from Space Camp,

We are off on the bus in an hour. I actually slept right through the night
for the first time, went down to the 'bathroom', looked out of the
porthole window and was surprised to see it was daylight. You have no idea
if it's day or night in the habitat in your room, or the hallways. The
kids also seem to be better adjusted now, although Adam has a slight sore
throat and didn't sleep well. Another surprise this morning was the
thunder storm that gently passed over. We have cooler temps, grey skies
and intermittent rain, so obviously have timed our week well. Very
impressive lightening and a few good thunder peels ... no sign of a
tornado thankfully.

So they all graduated yesterday, in a short ceremony which started with
the national anthem. We all faced the flag and the Americans put their
hands on their hearts. The teams were brought up and presented with a
photo, flight pin and certificate, then they had some awards:

Space Bowl winners (a quiz on what they learned) ... Jonathan, Adam and
Stephen plus 3 Americans

Area 51 team building champions .... Emma, Stephen and 3 Americans

Engineering challenge award .... Emma and 3 Americans

Outstanding team of the week .... Von Braun

The Von Braun team had drawn up a list of words that summarised their time
at camp, which included:

Leadership, Teamwork, Fears Overcome, Balance, Trust, Friendship.

The girls especially connected with each other, Kiwi, American and Costa
Rican making , as they described it, ' a real family feeling' ... and were
sad to part.

Then we had the trip to Cathedral Cavern, which was a great opportunity
for them all to get out of the camp and see some of the Alabama
countryside. Low rolling hills covered in deciduous forrest, for the most
part. It was nice sitting at the front of the bus and hearing the kid's
conversations drifting up from behind me ... Ashleigh and Paulina were
laughing about the mission, the gas man dying and everything else that
happened ... most of the others also swopping stories about the missions,
"Oh, we left the shuttle doors open on landing and we all died!" The cave
itself was even more impressive than I had remembered and took an hour
and a half to go through. Massive stalactites, vast interior ... could fit
a 6 stored biulding inside ... underground river and more. One of the best
features was our tour guide, a good old southern girl, who played on her
accent and simple Alabama mentality very well.

Back to camp with free time after dinner. The whole group relaxed by the
sand volleyball court in the warm evening air. Volleyball was played in
very good spirit until dark, lots of humour ... a really nice bunch of
teenagers to be with.

So this section of our adventure closes. Tara would like to stay on for
another week and a couple liked the idea of the summer camp, which runs
for 12 days and has a 24 hour mission at the end!

So, onto Florida and hopefully the shuttle launch. We have transport
arranged, leaving Orlando at 4.30am on Monday morning. Lets hope the
launch schedule does not change.

This is Space Camp, Alabama signing off,

Over and out

David