7/16/2011 – NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

We crossed the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel to the next 1000 Trails park near Quinby on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, the long skinny part of the peninsula called “Delmarva”, after the 3 states   Delaware, Maryland & Virginia.   With Chesapeake Bay on the east and the Atlantic Ocean on the west, it has 2 bridges & 2 underwater tunnels, plus miles of trestles and causeways. 

It costs $20 each way for truck & trailer…I suppose that’s a mere pittance to cross one of the “Seven Engineering Wonders of the World”.

Right after you get off the bridge is the Eastern Shore of Virginia NWR.  We stopped for a passport stamp, and a quick tour of the Visitors Center, but it was too hot to go out on any of the trails.

Some place or another I’d picked up a brochure for the Visitor Center at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.  Since we went right by it on the way to Chincoteague, we decided to stop.  Also, it was free, which is always a deciding factor to those of us on a fixed income.  :) 

The facility was established in 1945 for aeronautic research and is still used for management of suborbital research programs (mostly balloons).  From the rooftop, you can see across to the Wallops Flight Facility.  You can see all sorts of communications equipment plus barracks and planes.

There are some interesting exhibits in the Visitors Center.  My favorite was the pictures from space titled “Earth as Art”.

We chatted with the volunteers for quite a while about our travels, then continued on to the island.

A few more pics from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center