Go! Go! Go! GO! and Cheers from the crowd as the Falcon Heavy Rocket basted off.

Jonathan joined us after enjoying a day at Disney.  We all drove over early in the morning to watch the launch of the Falcon Heavy Rocket.  After getting a great parking spot, we watched the dolphins and pelicans feeding on a school of fish.  Later a couple of horseshoe crabs swam right in front of us.  We then settled in for a long wait.

After 6 hours and being disappointed with countdown delays in the launch, the rocket blasted off.

Going! Going! Going! GONE!

It took so long for the sound to make it to us at 12 miles away.  What a rumble!  It was fascinating seeing the most powerful currently available rocket on the planet fire off.

After it was almost completely out of sight the two outer rockets seperated and returned to the Kennedy Space center. It is hard to see from my pictures but they both stuck the landing. Perfect!

We later learned that the center rocket did not land on the offshore platform as planned.  Still the next stage did fire and send its payload into space.

After a few turns around the Earth, Elon Musk's Roadster will be on its way to Mars with Starman ( a space suit) in the driver's seat.  SpaceX attached several cameras to the car so we would have a view.

I know it looks a bit hard to believe but these are pictures of a car being "driven" by a Space suit to Mars.  He has one hand on the wheel and his arm on the door.  The dash has Don't Panic on the center screen as a tribute to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book. A copy of the book is supposed to be in the glove compartment with a towel  because as the book reports "No one should travel in space without their towel".  The radio is playing a song by David Bowie about Starman and life on Mars.

We had a great time and even with the long wait it was worth it.