LEARN
Huntsville, Alabama, is nicknamed “Rocket City,” and for good reason. It is the place where the rockets that carried astronauts to the moon in the late 1960s and early 1970s were developed, and the city is involved in the Space Launch System used by recent past and future NASA Artemis missions. Huntsville is home to the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, the Smithsonian-affiliated visitor center for the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in nearby Arsenal, Alabama. The U.S. Space & Rocket Center has multiple spacecraft and original astronaut training modules, the Intuitive Planetarium with its 52-foot 3D screen, and multiple space flight simulators. Also in Huntsville is the Von Braun Astronomical Society, which operates two observatories in the city’s Monte Sano State Park. Society members are available to present to student groups in the Intuitive Planetarium with prior arrangement.
EXPERIENCE
Huntsville is home to the free and kid-friendly Lucky Duck Scavenger Hunt, with 15 bronze ducks hidden at attractions around downtown. The Huntsville/Madison County Visitor Center furnishes clue cards and prizes. Burritt on the Mountain is a mountaintop, X-shaped mansion insulated with hay bales with interpretations of 19th-century rural life. SIGNALS: The Museum of Information Explosion is a hands-on, immersive celebration of communications technology history and innovation, with more than 2,000 items, including early telegraphs, radios, televisions, and a lot more. Altitude Trampoline Park lets kids bounce, dodge, bonk each other, and swing on a trapeze to their hearts content.
EAT
Huntsville’s 88 Buffet caters to student groups up to 50 and communal seating, plus all-you-can-eat seafood, sushi, and meatballs galore. Boarhog’s Barbecue serves up homemade smoked bologna, chicken fingers, pulled pork, and fried green tomatoes.
LEARN MORE
Huntsville/Madison County Convention & Visitors Bureau
huntsville.org
Main Image: U.S. Space & Rocket Center; Credit: U.S. Space & Rocket Center
