#most American spacecraft do not land on land but rather at sea

[fleshchyme]

NASA is going to be launching the first crewed mission of the Boeing CST-100 Starliner tonight at 10:30pm EST. Coverage begins at 6:30pm EST.

Veteran astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams will take Starliner through its paces for a week, including a docking with the International Space Station, before returning to Earth and landing at the White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico.

[heliosphoenix]

State of the planet: 2018 edition

Well here we are, it's time once again for my now annual review of the year we just finished up. When we take some time out of our New Year's celebrations to recognize that while it seems like we just went through 365 days of pain and frustration, there was a smattering of good things that happened as well.

Here's some of them:

Scientists in China cloned two monkeys via Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer, a major development toward's the potential for this technique to be used for regenerative cloning in the future

A new drug designed to combat Ovarian Cancer has begun clinical trials. Early results show that half the patients taking the drug are now Cancer free with no sign of the Cancer returning

Chinese scientists have developed rice that will grow in drought conditions. They plan to cover about 10% of the desert in the UAE with this rice for farming use.

An effort is underway to save the Northern White Rhino from extinction, using frozen sperm implanted in eggs from Southern White Rhinos, the hope is that this process will be able to revive the species in the future

A Ukrainian company is placing Solar Panels around Chernobyl to generate Solar Power. They plan to use the existing infrastructure to eventually generate up to 100 Megawatts of energy

101 cities around the world are now getting 70% of their power from renewable energy sources. In a related story, 56 cities in the United States have committed to going 100% renewable by 2050

The World Health Organization reported that Paraguay has now completely eradicated Malaria, other Latin America nations are close to doing so as well

The Ocean Cleanup Project has begun an initiative to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. They're aiming to remove at least 50 tons of garbage from the ocean every year

The Ozone is beginning to repair itself. At current rates, the Northern Hemisphere should be fully repaired by 2030, with the Ozone Hole in Antarctica sealed by 2060

The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge was opened, it's the world's longest sea crossing bridge

Chinese scientist He Jiankui announced that he's modified the DNA of twin infant girls in an attempt to make them resistant to HIV

According to a report by the International Telecommunications Union, 51.2% of the world's population is using the Internet

Qantas launched the first commercial non stop service between Australia and the United Kingdom, the route is flown by their 787 fleet

Cinemas opened in Saudi Arabia for the first time since 1983, the first movie shown is Black Panther

Diplomatic talks took place between North and South Korea, with both nations committing to the removal of land mines from the Demilitarized Zone between the nations

The Basque separatist group ETA announced its dissolution

The Supreme Court of India decriminalized homosexuality

Ireland citizens voted to repeal the nations ban on abortion in a national referendum

Voting turnout for the US Midterm elections was at a 50 year high

Michigan was the latest state to legalize recreational use of Marijuana, Canada also voted to allow sale of Marijuana.

The overall crime rate for the year is expected to have dropped by 2.9%

11% of the US Population is expected to get a boost to their credit scores

Homeownership rates for Americans under 35 are now at just over 36%, the highest since 2013

Americans gave over $400 Billion to charity this year, a record high

The 2018 Winter Olympics were held in South Korea

The 2018 World Cup was held in Russia with France claiming their second title. It was also announced that the United States, Mexico and Canada will host the 2026 World Cup

The Philadelphia Eagles won their first Super Bowl over the heavily favored New England Patriots

Tiger Woods won his first PGA tournament since 2013

The Michigan Basketball team did so much better than anyone could've expected, winning their second consecutive Big Ten tournament, and making their second Final Four appearance in 5 years

The Michigan Football team had a decent year as well, posting their third 10-3 record under Jim Harbaugh as well as winning a share of the Big Ten East division title (but because two of those losses were to Notre Dame and Ohio State, Michigan fans will be forced to spend the offseason being miserable twats again)

Justify won the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing, the second horse to win the title in 3 years (rather remarkable considering the previous title drought was nearly 4 decades)

SpaceX launched 21 Falcon rockets this year, including the first Falcon Heavy rocket which sent Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster into interplanetary space

NASA had a busy year as well, launching the TESS spacecraft to search for ExoPlanets, the Parker Solar Probe to explore the Sun's atmosphere, and the InSight lander which successfully touched down on Mars in November

ESA launched the BepiColombo spacecraft to explore the planet Mercury, the first mission to the planet in over a decade

The OSIRIS-REx sample returned spacecraft arrived at the Asteroid Bennu.

Finally, the New Horizons spaceprobe will conduct a flyby of the Kuiper Belt Object Ultima Thule just after midnight tonight!

Remember all that? Good. Because that's where I'm at right now: December 31, 2018, with just over 11 hours left in this year.

You, dear reader, are in the future. And by the time you read this, it's very likely that for you 2018 will be over. Relegated to the books. And you've probably read a bunch of articles and blogs and tweets about how we just went through a year of infinite pain. Which is why I'm hoping that this missive finds you after you've already read all those other things.

Because our minds tend to place the most emphasis on the last thing we experienced, and I want your lasting memory of 2018 to be that all those things I listed above happened this year, and nothing can ever erase them.

Now this is the part where I say something nice and worldly to tie up the events of this last trip around the ol' Sun. I try my best to come up with some theme or other that brings it all together into a coherent picture.

I think the word I would use to describe this year is "Revelation." Because I think we can all say that this year, it's not so much that we learned things, but things were revealed to us.

We've all been in this situation before. We think that we've got everything figured out, we have all the answers. And then all of a sudden we uncover something that completely shatters our perceptions and kicks our foundation out from under us. And based on all that's happened this past year, I think it's safe to say this happened to all of us at least once in the preceding 12 months.

Perhaps someone did something you never thought they would do? Or something that seemed to be amazing turned out not to be as good as you thought? Or maybe your way of viewing the world now looks totally alien to you?

Revelation can be a very traumatic thing to deal with, and I can tell you from experience that when your entire perception of reality is challenged, you become unsure about everything else. Doubts creep into your mind, and you start wondering what else it might be that you're wrong about? It's the kind of feeling that can make you feel completely alone even in the middle of thousands of people.

But Revelation can also be a good thing.

Sometimes something turns out to be even better than you were expecting. Or you discover that you actually are much more respected and valued than you thought you were. Or maybe you look around and realize that things aren't actually as bad as they seem.

Even if you have to deal with the Revelation of a harsh truth, you can still find the positive out of that. Sure you can choose to become cynical and jaded and let it consume you, or you can choose to be proactive about it.

Sure, things weren't what you thought they were, but that's okay. The world didn't come to an end, you still have much to be thankful for, and you can now use the knowledge that you've learned to become wiser about how to live your life.

So this is the part where I usually say that there's one more awesome thing that happened this year, but you're going to tell me what it is. Tell me something good that happened to you during 2018.

This time however, I'd like to try something different.

In addition to telling me something good that happened to you this year, I'd like you to give me the biggest Revelation you've had this year. What was the most surprising thing that was revealed to you?

Now I understand that it probably won't be as pleasant of a memory as whatever awesome thing that happened to you this year was, it may even cause you distress just thinking about it.

If that's the case, embrace it, because you are distressed. But not over whatever it was that you were forced to confront, but rather the loss of what you thought the world was.

But don't let it consume you. Take the truth that was revealed to you and apply it. Learn from it and resolve to use that truth to strengthen your resolve for this next trip around the Sun.

Things aren't always what they seem, and they often don't work out how you planned, but that's not always a bad thing. Because the amazing thing about this world is that things have a way of working out anyway.

So remember the good times, but learn from the Revelations. When you do that, you'll be that much closer to being the person you want to be.

Have a good day, a great month, and an AMAZING 2019.

[asfeedin]

NASA astronauts may train on private suborbital spaceships

NASA astronauts may start hitching commercial rides to suborbital space in the near future. 

According to NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, agency astronauts may use private suborbital flights for training and research experiments once these commercial trips have been proven safe. Such jaunts could help pave the way for the next crewed mission to the surface of the moon, which NASA aims to do in 2024.

Related: What’s the difference between orbital and suborbital spaceflight?

Brief suborbital flights would allow astronauts to gain experience in, and familiarity with, the space environment without being subjected to the hazards of long-duration missions, Bridenstine said. 

“This is a big shift for NASA,” he said on March 2 at the Next Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference in Broomfield, Colorado. “But it’s an important shift.”

This shift could aid NASA’s Artemis program of crewed lunar exploration, Bridenstine emphasized. In addition to the 2024 landing goal, Artemis aims to establish a long-term sustainable human presence on and around the moon by the late 2020s. Such work, in turn, will help pave the way for crewed Mars missions, which the agency wants to achieve in the 2030s.

“You are the commercial partners that will enable us to go to the moon sustainably,” he told the crowd of scientists and space corporation members.

No waiver required

Suborbital flights reach space or brush its edges. As these flights rise above the Karman line, the point above sea level that marks entry into space, the high velocity and reduced gravity can provide space-like environments for scientific research. (Though not everyone agrees on where space begins, the most commonly mentioned boundary is 62 miles, or 100 kilometers, up.)

Already, a handful of companies are sending experiments toward or beyond this boundary using balloons as well as rockets. For example, Virgin Galactic has already flown two piloted test flights to suborbital space, and Blue Origin has launched a number of uncrewed demonstration missions with its New Shepard suborbital system. 

Both of these companies have flown research experiments on their suborbital test missions, and Virgin has already sold tickets to passengers who want to travel into space.

Suborbital flights provide a way to test new technologies in space over and over again before putting travelers at risk. “That’s a capability we as a nation have not had until recently,” Bridenstine said.

Private contractors already carry equipment to the International Space Station. But Bridenstine sees private flight as a doorway to more than just package delivery. “NASA astronauts would fly with equipment and payloads,” he said.

In exchange, NASA would expect a high level of safety. “We’re not going to have astronauts sign a waiver,” Bridenstine said, a step likely to be required for private passengers.

Using a private spacecraft will in some ways require less oversight from the space agency. Rather than certifying and qualifying each individual component, a process that takes years, NASA would instead certify the flights themselves.

Or rather, let the flights certify themselves. Bridenstine said he anticipates that repeated successful flights by a private company would go a long way toward proving their safety.

Still, there would be qualifications. In order to qualify to carry crew to the International Space Station, Bridenstine said, commercial spaceflight companies must meet about 30 requirements from NASA. Suborbital flights would require similar qualification, but it wouldn’t be as difficult to obtain.

“I think if we did it right, we could take those 30 requirements [and] we could cut them down to 20,” Bridenstine said.

Suborbital flight also opens the door for non-NASA travelers to space.

“We’re rapidly approaching the day when a lot of people are going to be astronauts,” Bridenstine said. “That’s good for our nation and good for the world.”

Related: NASA’s Artemis program (reference)

To the moon

On Earth, weathering and plate tectonics have changed the planet over billions of years, wiping out much of the evidence of the planet in its youth. But the early days of the solar system are still visible on the lunar surface, whose surface remains relatively unchanged since its formation. Some scientists worry that human boots on the lunar regolith could erase much of that evidence.

But Bridestone doesn’t agree. Instead, he thinks science on the moon will be enhanced by human exploration.

“We can get to every part of the moon,” he said. “The amount of science we’re going to get is amazing.”

Bridenstine pointed to the Dark Ages Polarimetry Pathfinder (DAPPER), a proposed radio mission to the far side of the moon that could investigate the early universe soon after the Big Bang. Current estimates put DAPPER’s price tag around $500 million, Bridenstine said. But if humans were on the moon, DAPPER and other missions could use infrastructure for power and communications, reducing the cost to $90 million.

“That means more astrophysics than ever before,” Bridenstine said.

The tension between science and exploration is a constant battle, he said. But it shouldn’t be. “It’s not that we’re competing against science,” he said. “We’re enabling science.”

Sending humans to the moon will allow a more in-depth exploration than could be possible from orbiters and rovers, Bridenstine stressed.

“It’s not what we’re giving up to get the moon,” he said. “It’s what we’re gaining.”

And returning to the moon is important, not only for science but also for exploration.

“I’m the first NASA administrator in history alive when we have not had people living and working on another world,” the 44-year-old Bridenstine said. But when the Apollo missions changed history, they did so only for a specific class of people: white men. Bridenstine sees the next trip to the moon as a far more inclusive journey.

“This time, we go to the moon with all Americans,” he said. “We have to make this our moment in history.”

Bridenstine and other NASA officials have repeatedly said that at least one of the two astronauts who lands on the moon in 2024 will be a woman.

No longer a ‘zero-sum game’

Artemis isn’t the first post-Apollo push to return to the moon. Bridenstine said one reason these other efforts have failed is that the NASA budget tends to be a “zero-sum game, where the budget is flat.”

One previous attempt cannibalized money from the International Space Station, raising protests from states intimately involved like Texas, California and Florida. Another battle to send humans to Mars culled money from NASA’s science budget, leading to more infighting among space-supporting politicians.

The 2021 federal budget request proposed a $25.2 billion NASA budget, an increase of $6 billion over the agency’s average take over the last three years. Roughly half of the increase goes into Deep Space Exploration Systems, including human landing systems and Gateway, a planned NASA waystation for humans and robots en route to the lunar surface.

In previous years, Bridenstine said, the White House has been hammered in the press for cutting the space budget. That’s because in previous Januarys, Congress has provided an appropriation larger than the request for the budget, which is released in February, making the budget request seem like a cut even though the proposed amount grows each year.

“Now we have a $25.2 billion budget [for space]. I dare Congress to beat it,” he said with a grin.

Follow Nola on Facebook and on Twitter at @NolaTRedd. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook. 

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Tags: astronauts, NASA, private, spaceships, suborbital, train

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[lethaderr-blog]

Here are the best things to do in southern for active and outdoor adventurers.

It was my first time visiting the state of and I really didn’t know what to expect. I was in town for the Women in Summit conference (WITS), and it was a great excuse to check a new state off my bucket list. After spending some time in Portland, it was time to venture away from the city. As I had my own car, I had the freedom to go wherever I wanted. Yes, this crazy road trip warrior drove solo on a 10 hour trip from Toronto to Portland. After making this journey, I feel like I can own the term “road trip warrior” and also the “crazy” part of the title, too (though I did break up the drive into manageable chunks).

Anyway, after my time at WITS, I headed south to check out the southern coast on a trip with The Beaches. There are lots of things to do in southern for outdoor adventure enthusiasts. I had the opportunity to check out several exciting places for those wanting to get outside, explore nature, or try a new activity. While there are many attractions in York County, I’ll break up this itinerary by city, starting from south in Kittery to north in Kennebunkport. While you won’t see any beaches on this itinerary, this listing of things to do in southern can be enjoyed from spring right through to the fall.

SOUTHERN MAINE TRAVEL GUIDE

WHERE TO STAY IN THE MAINE BEACHES REGION: I loved staying at The Dunes on the Waterfront in Ogunquit. You can read my review a little further down on this page. Book your stay at The Dunes or read more reviews by fellow travelers. While I highly recommend staying at The Dunes, you can also choose to browse the available listings on Airbnb if you’re looking for a shared room or your own home. Here are some more hotels in The Beaches.

GETTING AROUND SOUTHERN MAINE: I recommend having access to a car when you visit The Beaches. A lot of the places on this particular itinerary are far apart from one another. Having a car makes this trip possible. If you don’t have your own, consider renting a car for this trip.

MORE THINGS TO DO IN MAINE: For all of the best things to do in New York State, check out all of my other blog posts.

PHOTOS OF THE MAINE BEACHES REGION: Check out our entire photo album of pictures from southern to inspire your trip. You can also purchase prints, housewares, and all sorts of gifts made from any of our photos – just click the “buy” button on any picture.

Kittery

Let’s start just about as far south as we can go in the state of : Kittery. The town of Kittery is just across a bridge from Portsmouth, New Hampshire. While Kittery might be known for its outlet shopping, I headed straight to one of the most unique things to do on the coast of .

Take Flight Aerial Park

The aerial adventures and ziplines at Take Flight are one of the most thrilling things to do in southern . Strap on your harness and helmet, we’re going on an adventure! I experienced the Aerial Challenge Course and it was exhilarating, demanding, and even a little bit scary at times. With that said, you can choose how much or little to challenge yourself. It’s an epic journey for kids and adults alike. 

The adventure course at Take Flight a place to climb, swing, and hang around, quite literally. It’s perfect for all abilities, even if you’ve never done a ropes course before. You’ll need to visit with a partner as the course operates on a buddy system where you’ll be responsible for the safety of your partner (and vice versa). There are over 65 elements on the adventure course, including cargo nets, bridges, swinging tires, various platforms, ropes, and all sorts of inventive materials to swing around on.

Some of these are easier to figure out than others. It’s quite simple to realize that you need to climb through a cargo net. But, you might encounter a set of buoys suspended in the air and wonder, “how the heck am I going to get across this?” It’s all a part of the fun. I found myself laughing over and over again with the antics I seemed to get myself into on this course.

There are three levels of apparatus and swinging platforms that you’ll encounter. You can choose just how high you want to go and which bridges to cross. When my travel buddy, Retha and I got to a certain spot that was a little too intimidating, we’d exclaim something like, “Oh hell, no!” and choose an alternate route. And then there were other moments where a set of swings looked rather daring and we’d give it a shot. In the end, I felt quite pleased and accomplished that I’d attempted the adventure course. Take Flight is one of the best southern attractions, and I urge you to check it out with one of your friends.

When you visit the Take Flight adventure course, you’ll be able to climb around for a maximum of 2 hours. You’ll receive a “pre-flight” training to prepare you for the excursion. Wear sneakers, sunscreen, and sunglasses. Don’t bring your camera, phone, or anything else with you. Take Flight staff members will take photos of you, so you don’t need to worry about damaging your gear on the course. Thank you so much to the staff at Take Flight for taking these photos of us!

York

Next, we drive a little bit up the road to York where you can find an excellent place to hit the trails. Some of the best hiking in southern is at Mount Agamenticus. My second stop in York isn’t really an outdoor adventure per se, but a beautiful scenic location to view the Nubble Lighthouse.

Mount Agamenticus

If there’s one place where you need to go hiking in southern , it’s Mount Agamenticus. Known as “Mount A” for short, the Mount Agamenticus Conservation Region sprawls across 10,000 acres within a 30,000 acre section of conservation land in southern . In fact, the region surrounding Mount A makes up one of the largest unfragmented forests in coastal New England. Within this unique coastal forest, you’ll find the highest diversity of plant and animal species in the whole state. You might spot whitetail deer, moose, spotted turtles, black racer snakes, or even a black bear. I didn’t manage to see any wildlife this time around, but you never know what you might see on the trail.

Mount A also happens to be one of ’s best sites to watch migrating raptors, including peregrine falcons, bald eagles, osprey, and hawks. In the fall, you can see hundreds of birds migrating within a few hours from the summit. On average, 4000 raptors migrate through this location annually. Make sure you visit Mount Agamenticus in late September through mid October on a clear day with a strong northwest wind.

The trails surrounding Mount A are perfect for hikers, bikers, and even winter activities like snowshoeing. Along with a local guide, we started at the bottom of Mount A and hiked up to the top. It’s a very gradual incline, so it’s not terribly challenging. However, it’s a great location for sightseeing and spending a few hours in nature. There are numerous informative plaques along the way about the history of the region, as well as the kinds of trees you’ll come across on your journey. 

Eventually, you’ll reach the summit of Mount A, which is also directly accessible by car. At the summit, there are several interesting features and lookouts. You can soak up views of the mountains in one direction, including Mount Washington on a clear day. From another vantage point, you can see right out to the Atlantic Ocean. There’s a circular deck at the middle of the summit with miniatures of various nearby attractions like Nubble Light and Goose Rocks Beach. Be sure to wander around this vast expanse of land to the various lookout decks and rocky ledges.

Nubble Light

Even though this isn’t technically an outdoor adventure, you really should go to see Nubble Light when you’re in York. You can actually see Nubble Light from Mount A, too! It’s a quick drive down to the ocean to view this beautiful southern lighthouse. Officially named Cape Neddick Light, the lighthouse sits on Nubble Island, about 100 meters off Cape Neddick Point. While the lighthouse itself is inaccessible to the general public, you can easily view it from the edge of Cape Neddick Point. There’s a big parking lot, so you can pull right up and take a look. Going to see Nubble Light is one of the most iconic things to do on the coast of .

Built in 1879, the lighthouse is 41 feet tall but is positioned 88 feet above sea level. It sits up on top of a high, rocky island. Nubble Light is still in use today. It’s a classic example of an American lighthouse. A picture of the Nubble Light is included on the Voyager spacecraft, along with examples of other famous man made structures like the Great Wall of China and the Taj Mahal.

Ogunquit

Ogunquit has some of the most stunning views that I’ve seen throughout my time in . I recommend that you take a drive down to Perkins Cove and explore the adorable village, including the beautiful coastline. Park your car at Perkins Cove and take a walk on the Marginal Way.

Marginal Way

The Marginal Way is one of the prettiest coastal footpaths in New England. The term “margin” refers to the space between the land and the sea. Take a stroll down this 1.25 mile pathway to get right up close to the crashing waves of the Atlantic Ocean. Even on a cloudy and somewhat dreary day, it’s so magical. The water is seemingly drawn towards the shore, violently crashing into the rocks and cliffs. There are 39 benchs along this relatively short stretch, inviting visitors to take a break. Sit back and enjoy the view.

Perkins Cove

Perkins Cove is a cute village at one end of the Marginal Way. There are many boutiques, cafes, and restaurants in town, although many of them are seasonal. While only a handful of them were open when I visited in early May, I didn’t mind that at all. There weren’t many people around, and I felt at times like I had many southern attractions all to myself. 

The Perkins Cove Drawbridge is the most iconic sight in Perkins Cove. It overlooks a lovely little harbor, and it might be the only double leaf draw footbridge left in the . I didn’t happen to see any boats sailing through, but the drawbridge can be raised to allow tall ships to enter the harbor. The harbormaster typically operates the drawbridge. However, if he isn’t available, it’s up to the average citizen or visitor to help out. There’s a button right on the bridge itself that you can push to raise the bridge. I didn’t have the unique opportunity to push that button, but fingers crossed that you get the chance!

Kennebunk

Did you know that Kennebunk is the only village with that name in the entire world? With such a unique name, I wouldn’t expect that any other town would be called ‘Kennebunk.’ All of the residents want you to know that. At the entrance to the town, there’s a sign stating: “Welcome to Kennebunk, The Only Village in the World So Named.” So, there you have it. Definitely wander around town here. You’ll discover a river with a small waterfall, a charming little park, and a main street with lots of little boutiques.

Garden Street Bowl

Now, a bowling alley wouldn’t generally be on my list of outdoor adventures. But, it’s a fantastic place to head in the evening after a long day of activities. Grab your travel gang and head straight to Garden Street Bowl. It’s a newly renovated bowling alley that’s inside an old repurposed grocery store. There’s a massive bar, restaurant, and a games room located in a long room where the shopping carts used to be stored. I’ll write a little bit more about what I ordered at the restaurant, but this food is not your average bowling alley grub. Garden Street Bowl is the perfect rainy day activity, and it’s open super late (until 11pm most days, and until midnight on Friday and Saturday). 

Kennebunkport

Wandering around Kennebunkport may very well be one of the best things to do on the coast of . While I didn’t participate in any particular activities or adventures, it’s a quaint village to go for a walk. I loved the colorful buildings and the views of the docked boats. Sometimes the best adventures are the ones that you don’t overly plan. Go for a stroll in Kennebunkport and admire the scenery around you.

Scenic Flight of the Coast

Now that you’ve visited all of the towns on the southern coast, why not take a look at them from up above? Taking a scenic flight with Southern Aviation was one of the most memorable aspects of the entire trip. There’s nothing quite like witnessing the natural beauty of the sand dunes from up above. You can see the crashing waves along the coast from high in the sky. Soar above the treetops and marvel at the landscapes of coastal . 

Our aircraft was a small, four seat plane (including the pilot). You can embark on a flight with two of your friends, and you’ll each have your own window for the amazing views. The plans are modern, well equipped, and incredibly safe. Our pilot, Paul, had over 25 years of experience flying with American Airlines. You’re in good hands!

While you can choose your flight path, we decided to leave it up to the expert. He took us on a journey to see so many southern attractions, like Nubble Light, York Harbor, Kennebunkport, Ogunquit (we even spotted our hotel from the air), and even Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Flights start and end at the Sanford Airport, which is just 14 miles west of Kennebunk. You can take flights lasting anywhere from a half hour to two hours. Taking a scenic flight with Southern Aviation is incredibly affordable at a rate of $195 per hour (it’s a great price, especially if you split it between 3 people). 

Curious about learning how to fly an airplane? This first “discovery flight” counts as your first lesson towards earning your pilot license. If you’re a local or live nearby and would like to take flying lessons, Southern Aviation can hook you up. If you’re like me and you want to leave the flying up to the experts, it’s easy to hop on board for a short flight to soak up the stunning views.

Where to Eat

While it was relatively easy to find vegan food in the city of Portland, it was a little more challenging in southern . There were a few plant-based and very vegan-friendly establishments, but they are only open seasonally during the summer months. You might be thinking that visiting as a vegan could be next to impossible, especially since the state is most known for its lobster. Don’t worry, I always find a way to make it work! I discovered several restaurants with vegan dishes that were very delicious.

Squeeze

The Squeeze is a local chain of smoothie shops. Their location in Kittery resembles a small juice shack. It’s actually a juice bar inside a repurposed drive through bank location. I love when companies are able to find new uses for old buildings. At The Squeeze, you can find all sorts of smoothies and smoothie bowls in every flavor. I couldn’t resist ordering a Bananarama (without the yogurt) because it had espresso in it. The smoothie was super refreshing and definitely hit the spot.

Heckman’s Pub at Nonantum Resort

Heckman’s Pub is a small bar inside the Nonantum Resort in Kennebunkport. You don’t need to stay overnight at the hotel to take advantage of the dining options. Heckman’s Pub has several local beers on tap, as well as a small menu of yummy eats. The vegan offering on the menu is the cauliflower tacos. I love the little round taco shells that look more like little taco bowls. Not only is there roasted cauliflower in them, but there’s also grilled pineapple salsa. You’ve gotta try this tasty take on a taco.

Garden Street Bowl

The Crotux Kitchen and Taphouse is the restaurant inside Garden Street Bowl. While it might seem rather casual (you can choose to dine at a table, the bar, or right at your bowling alley!), there’s an extensive menu of food and drink options. There are dozens of local beers on tap, including kombucha (I sampled a pint of the ginger kombucha). For my meal, I was in a snacking kind of mood, so I ordered the roasted chili hummus and the fries with truffle ketchup. If you plan to go bowling at Garden Street Bowl, be sure to stay for a meal as it goes well above and beyond what you’d typically expect to eat at a bowling alley.

Mike’s Clam Shack

This is most likely the last place you’d expect a vegan to dine. Mike’s Clam Shack in Wells, has a very tasty vegan veggie burger on their menu. I verified with the restaurant staff that the burger is vegan. It might be the only option on the menu, but it’s a good one. If you happen to be traveling with some seafood loving friends, you won’t go hungry. 

Norma’s Restaurant

Norma’s Restaurant is a bit of a greasy spoon, but it’s a favorite among the locals. The veggie folks in the crowd will find fried potatoes and toast with jam as a breakfast offering.

Cafes & Coffee

If you know me, you’ll know that I like to stay caffeinated! I’m always seeking the best cafes and coffee shops while I travel, and I managed to find a few excellent ones in southern . Here’s where you’ll find some of the best coffee in York County.

Lil’s Cafe

Lil’s Cafe in Kittery serves up delicious coffee and espresso beverages. They also make all of their own baked goods and pastries right on site. Unfortunately, they don’t have any vegan pastries at the moment, but they do have lots of freshly baked bread. I ordered an Americano and it was exactly what I needed as a pick me up. As an added bonus, check out Lil’s Vinyl Vault, a vintage record shop connected directly to the cafe. Searching for a particular LP? You might find that retro gem at Lil’s Vinyl Vault. Coffee and records is a pretty sweet combination.

Dock Square Coffee House

The Dock Square Coffee House is right in the main tourist area of Kennebunkport. I stopped by for a morning coffee and sat at the front window, sipping my drink and watching the people stroll by. Many visitors stopped by for their morning brew, and I even managed to see a couple of dogs on their morning walks. Be sure to stop by this charming little coffee shop for a break in your sightseeing activities in the Beaches region.

Christian’s Cafe and Eatery

Christian’s Cafe and Eatery is right along the main street of Kennebunk. I stopped by as I was wandering around town because I felt a little bit hungry and definitely in need of some caffeine. While they didn’t have any vegan items on the menu, the staff members were so helpful and kind. They offered to prepare a bagel with vegetable toppings in place of the cream cheese (cucumber, lettuce, and onion). I also ordered a soy milk cappuccino, which was very yummy.

Where to Stay in Southern

My choice for the best place to stay in Southern is The Dunes on the Waterfront. It’s a collection of cozy cottages right on the Ogunquit River. It’s like having your own home away from home, right on the edge of the water. This accommodation is a little slice of paradise in a very tranquil setting. The cottages are spaced apart just the right amount for a secluded atmosphere.

The cottage itself has everything you could need for a comfortable stay: a large bed, a full kitchen, a flat screen TV with satellite channels, complimentary Wi-Fi, and even a wood burning fireplace. My cottage had a covered and screened in front porch, which is such a lovely place to unwind in peace. You can also explore the sand dunes and Ogunquit beach from Dunes on the Waterfront. The hotel staff will provide you with a time table for the tides where you’ll learn when you can easily walk across the river or take a rowboat. You can book out the rowboats through the front desk. 

I highly recommend waking up to watch the sunrise over the Ogunquit River and the Atlantic Ocean. While it means getting up as early as 5:00am and a great sunrise isn’t a guarantee, it’s so completely worth it for those vibrant skies. On my first morning at The Dunes, it was very overcast. While my surroundings still looked beautiful, it wasn’t quite as brilliant as I had hoped. However, on my second morning, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky as the sun seemingly came up from beyond the river itself. It was absolutely gorgeous.

Ogunquit is a central location for your holiday to southern . You’re right in the middle of it all. Plus, The Dunes on the Waterfront is one of the most unique properties at which I’ve had the pleasure of staying. It’s a peaceful sanctuary away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. You can kick back and relax here, whether you’re enjoying a crackling fire in your fireplace, reading a book on your front porch, or taking in one of nature’s best performances as the sun comes up. Be sure to book your stay at The Dunes on the Waterfront. You can also read more reviews by fellow travelers by clicking here.

Map of Things to Do in Southern

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SpaceX Launch: Highlights From the Crew Dragon Safety Test

An explosive flash over the sea

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The rocket launched. Less than two minutes later, it exploded.

It appears to be a success.

Usually the destruction of a rocket in flight means a mission is a failure. But on Sunday, SpaceX was demonstrating a crucial safety system of Crew Dragon, a capsule that is to carry astronauts for NASA to the International Space Station.

There was no one on board Sunday’s flight. The passengers this time were two test dummies filled with sensors to measure the forces a real crew would experience should they ever need to be saved by the capsule’s escape system.

At 10:30 a.m. Eastern time, the rocket lifted off at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Spectators on the ground groaned and cursed when the rocket disappeared into the clouds a minute later. But viewers of NASA’s webcast saw a fireball engulf the rocket after the Crew Dragon capsule ignited its thrusters to accelerate away about 84 seconds into the flight.

The system proved itself, even during a phase of the flight when atmospheric forces on the spacecraft are most severe.

One large piece of the Falcon 9 rocket plummeted into the ocean, its impact sending up a mushroom-like plume.

The Crew Dragon executed the carefully designed choreography — jettisoning the bottom of the spacecraft, firing small thrusters and deploying its parachutes About 9 minutes after the test, the intact capsule landed in the Atlantic Ocean.

The demonstration was a success

At a news conference after the test, NASA and SpaceX officials beamed.

“Another amazing milestone is complete for our very soon-to-be project, which is launching American astronauts on American rockets from American soil for the first time since the retirement of the space shuttles,” said Jim Bridenstine, the NASA administrator.

Elon Musk, the founder and chief executive of SpaceX, said, “It was a picture perfect mission.”

SpaceX, along with Boeing, have been hired by NASA for its commercial crew program to build capsules and rockets to carry astronauts to orbit. This is a change from the past when NASA built and operated its own vehicles, like the space shuttles and the Saturn 5 rocket during the Apollo moon landings.

Sunday’s launch was a test of what is known as the in-flight abort system, and aims to verify that the capsule can whisk astronauts away safely from an exploding rocket. It is the last major milestone for SpaceX before NASA permits its astronauts on board.

The next flight of a Crew Dragon capsule will take two NASA astronauts, Douglas G. Hurley and Robert L. Behnken, to the space station. Mr. Musk said that the capsule for that flight should arrive in Florida arrive by the end of February.

On Sunday, Mr. Musk said that he, Mr. Bridenstine, and Kathy Lueders, manager of the commercial crew program for NASA, decided that it was most likely the flight would occur sometime during the second quarter of the year — sometime between April and June.

That will still be regarded as a demonstration flight before the Crew Dragon receives certification by NASA.

A test designed to go wrong

For veteran space watchers, almost every rocket launch is filled with nerve-racking worry that something will go wrong. Failures in the history of spaceflight have destroyed expensive payloads or have ended tragically, as in the case of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986, when the seven astronauts aboard were killed.

Sunday’s launch, of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with a Crew Dragon capsule on top, was one of the few times you could look forward with anticipation to destruction.

It was over quickly.

About 84 seconds after liftoff, the rocket was approximately 12 miles in the air, speeding at 1,200 miles per hour. The nine engines of the booster stage were to shut off, simulating a failure. The flight termination system — which would destroy the rocket in case it veered off course — was active, but was not set off by a “thrust termination” in the booster. Still, the rocket was ripped apart and exploded as powerful SuperDraco thrusters on the Crew Dragon capsule propelled the capsule away from the rocket, taking it to an altitude of about 27 miles.

The Dragon capsule then dropped off the “trunk,” or bottom half of the spacecraft, and small thrusters pushed it into the correct vertical orientation before parachutes deployed. It splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean about 9 minutes after launch and about 20 miles from where it started. Camera aboard the capsule showed a recovery crew arriving in a boat.

SpaceX will not recover the booster this time

SpaceX now routinely recovers and reuses the booster stages of its rockets after successfully landing them at a pad near the launch site, or on a floating platform in the ocean. The booster on this flight, designated B1046, has flown to space three times previously, but this time the violent forces of the Crew Dragon blasting away will cause it to be destroyed.

The second stage of the Falcon 9 was fully fueled, but it lacked an engine. Because the in-flight abort test occurred before the firing of the second stage, putting a real engine there would be an expensive waste.

SpaceX will clean up after itself. Four ships and at least four aircraft will scan the area and pick up debris in addition to plucking the capsule out of the water.

A time of great pressure

The abort test occurred during the phase of the launch when the atmospheric forces on the rocket are greatest — in many ways, the most difficult time to safely halt a trip to space.

Rocket scientists call this maximum aerodynamic pressure. Think of the force you feel when sticking your hand out the window of a fast-moving car. The faster the car is moving, the greater the force. But for a rocket, the atmosphere thins at higher altitudes, so the force peaks and then diminishes as the rocket enters outer space.

The period of maximum pressure occurred roughly one minute after launch, and lasted for about 30 seconds. During that time, the Falcon 9 throttled back its engines to reduce the pressure.

In equations, the quantity of pressure is typically labeled q, so it is often referred to as max-q.

How launch abort systems have saved lives

A Soyuz launch carrying astronauts to the space station in October 2018 demonstrated the value of a working launch-abort system.

A faulty sensor prevented one of the rocket’s side boosters from falling away cleanly. It instead hit the rocket’s central core. Abort motors accelerated the capsule with two astronauts, Tyler Nicklaus Hague of NASA and Aleksey Ovchinin of Russia, away from the disintegrating rocket.

They experienced forces six to seven times the usual force of gravity during their escape, but they landed safely.

The Crew Dragon accelerated at less harrowing speeds, with forces reaching 3.5 times the usual force of gravity.

Awaiting NASA’s decision on Boeing’s Starliner

In December, Boeing launched one of its Starliner capsules, without anyone aboard, on a demonstration mission where it was to dock with the space station. Had that succeeded, Boeing would have been largely ready for its first mission with astronauts.

However, a problem with the capsule’s clock — somehow the time was off by 11 hours — caused the spacecraft to waste propellant, and the space station docking was called off.

After about two days in orbit, the capsule returned to Earth, landing at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.

This month, NASA and Boeing have set up a team to investigate what went wrong, an effort expected to take about two months. Despite the mishap, NASA officials have said it is possible that the Starliner’s next demonstration flight will carry astronauts.

SpaceX is doing this test, but not Boeing

During a news conference on Friday, Ms. Lueders of NASA said the in-flight abort test was a crucial step for SpaceX to demonstrate that its spacecraft was ready to transport astronauts.

Yet, Boeing, the other company that will be flying NASA astronauts, will not be conducting such a test.

Instead, Boeing will be relying on data gathered from a test in November using a capsule launched from the ground, which is known as a “pad abort” test. SpaceX conducted a similar test five years ago.

NASA does not require an in-flight abort. Rather, the space agency allowed Boeing and SpaceX to propose their own testing programs. Ms. Lueders said this allows companies to devise cost-effective strategies that match their capabilities.

Because SpaceX reuses its boosters several times, blowing one up is not as costly. But Boeing is launching its Starliners on Atlas 5 rockets, which are more expensive and are only used once.

Boeing instead conducted extensive wind tunnel tests and computer analyses.

Shorter flights to space could blast off this year, too

Regardless of what SpaceX and Boeing do, it could be a busy year for people in space. Another pair of American companies could take passengers on brief trips to the edge of space.

The spacecraft built by Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic basically just go up and down like a big roller coaster and never accelerate to the speeds needed to reach orbit around Earth.

Last February, Virgin Galactic’s space plane carried a test crew of three to orbit. After years of delays, company officials are optimistically saying that commercial flights will begin in 2020.

In December, Blue Origin, the rocket company started by Jeff Bezos, the chief executive of Amazon, conducted a 12th test flight of its suborbital New Shepard spacecraft, but has not yet put any people aboard. It has not yet said when it would start flying passengers.

Neither company’s trip to space will be in reach of the average person. Virgin Galactic charges $250,000 for a seat, which will offer a few minutes of weightlessness. Blue Origin has not yet said what it will charge.

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Pence says US rocket companies will put astronauts in space this year. US rocket companies aren’t so sure.

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Pence says US rocket companies will put astronauts in space this year. US rocket companies aren’t so sure.

Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft brings astronauts to the ISS. ETA TBD. (NASA/)

With all the glory of the Apollo lunar landings, it can be easy to forget that the Soviet Union beat the US to most other milestones during the space race. Sputnik 1 was the first satellite. Laika, the first animal (dog) in orbit. Yuri Gagarin, the first person. For the last eight years, the Russia’s Roscosmos has regained another bragging right: it’s the only organization on the planet capable of getting humans off it.

Ever since the last space shuttle landed in 2011, the crewed US space program has been stranded without a ride to the International Space Station (ISS). NASA has rockets, but without a capsule capable of carrying astronauts the agency has resorted to purchasing seats on the Roscosmos’s Soyuz capsule—recently for 82 million dollars each. Eager to regain independent, affordable access to space, NASA has paid two private US companies to develop crewed capsules for them. Boeing is building the Crew Space Transportation (CST)-100 Starliner for 4.6 billion dollars, and SpaceX received 2.6 billion dollars to develop the Crew Dragon.

After years of delays, launch day appears to be getting closer. On Tuesday, at the sixth public meeting of the White House National Space Council, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said that Boeing and SpaceX are “on the brink of being ready.” Vice President Mike Pence, who chaired the meeting, spoke even more forcefully. “Before the year is out,” he said, America will send astronauts to space on American rockets from American soil.

Before booking Christmas vacation at Cape Canaveral, however, consider that Tuesday wasn’t the first time NASA and the administration have trotted out this talking point.

Here’s Bridenstine talking to USA TODAY in August 2018: “Without question, by the middle of next year, we’ll be flying American astronauts on American rockets from American soil.”

And again in April: “By the end of this year,” he repeated at a House Science Committee hearing, “we will be launching American astronauts on American rockets from American soil to the International Space Station.”

NASA originally hoped to have a shuttle replacement in place by 2015, but soon pushed back the goal to 2017. Since then, the dates on which Boeing and SpaceX were supposed to receive certification to fly astronauts have slipped no fewer than nine times for each company, according to a report from the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) published in June.

Fault lies on both sides. In the early years, NASA failed to adequately fund the projects, the agency found in 2016. Later delays, however, have been technical. Boeing had trouble dealing with powerful launch vibrations, and SpaceX changed their capsule to land at sea rather than on land. The science of tossing a vehicle into orbit may be pretty straightforward, but actually designing and building a spacecraft that keeps astronauts safe is, it turns out, anything but. Now, even representatives from the rocket companies themselves aren’t sure if they’ll make the current 2019 deadline (neither company responded to requests for comment).

Meanwhile NASA, whose Roscosmos contract expires in September 2020, is watching their progress closely. Here’s where each company stands.

Boeing The CST-100 has the farthest to go, with two tests standing between it and its first crewed launch. First, it will conduct an “orbital flight test,” launching on an Atlas rocket, docking autonomously with the ISS, and returning to Earth, all with no one aboard. If successful, Boeing will follow up the orbital flight test with a “pad abort test”—where the CST-100 checks its safety features by blasting away from its rocket on the launchpad and using parachutes for a soft touch down nearby. After those two tests, three astronauts—Nicole Mann, Mike Fincke, and Chris Ferguson—will fly in the Starliner for the first time.

Boeing aims to start the tests this fall, and the recent GAO report lists Boeing’s target crewed certification date as January 2020, falling short of Pence’s promise.

“We’re making real good progress on getting the Orbital Flight Test vehicle to the pad and ready to go,” said Peter McGrath, Boeing’s director of global sales and marketing for space exploration at a panel discussion in Indiana on Monday. “We’re heading towards an Orbital Flight Test in October.”

No Boeing flight currently appears on NASA’s launches and landings manifest, which covers events until October 3.

SpaceX Pence may be hoping that SpaceX squeaks in a crewed launch before the New Year, as the California-based company has a slight lead on Boeing. SpaceX faces a similar three-step path to getting astronauts onto the ISS, and has already cleared the first test. The Crew Demo-1 orbital test launched March 2 atop a Falcon rocket, docked with the ISS, and returned successfully to Earth. While preparing for an upcoming “in-flight abort test,” however, a leak caused an explosion on April 20, destroying the Crew Dragon capsule, and along with it any hopes of flying a crew on Crew Demo-2 in July.

Later in the summer, SpaceX representatives hinted that the company may miss the end-of-the-year deadline. “By the end of this year, I don’t think it’s impossible, but it’s getting increasingly difficult,” said Han Koenigsmann, SpaceX’s vice president of Build & Flight Reliability, on a conference call reporting the results of the company’s explosion investigation.

Recent comments, however, have been more positive. On Monday’s panel, Koenigsmann said the company is targeting October or November for its in-flight abort test. “Right after that, hopefully this year, we’ll have the Demo-2 flight,” he said, Jeff Foust of SpaceNews reports. SpaceX’s first passengers, whenever they fly, will be NASA veterans Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley.

Maybe Pence’s pronouncement springs from some unknown insider info, but Wednesday wasn’t the first time he’s floated a timeline that one might charitably describe as extremely optimistic. He also expects NASA to make some new footprints on the moon in 2024—four years earlier than the agency has planned—with no extra money to do so.

Regardless of whether Boeing and SpaceX crewmembers make it to the ISS before the ball drops, with recent timeline slips shrinking from years to months, it seems likely that NASA’s ride will be arriving soon.

Written By Charlie Wood

[technato]

China Promises the Moon

The next step may be the first-ever soft landing on the lunar far side

Illustration: MCKIBILLO

Illustration: MCKIBILLO

Last July, when a Chinese Long March 5 rocket lifted off from the country’s newest spaceport, the Wenchang Space Launch Center on the island of Hainan, the vehicle’s official mission was to place an experimental communications satellite into orbit. The launch, though, had a secondary purpose: It was to be a final test before the Long March 5, China’s newest and largest rocket, was entrusted with the country’s most ambitious science mission ever.

It failed the test.

The launch initially appeared to go well and was hailed on Chinese television⁠—which, in a rare move, broadcast the event live—as another success for the country’s increasingly ambitious space program. But keen-⁠eyed observers noticed that the trajectory of the rocket, as seen on displays visible during the broadcast, didn’t match the predicted path. Soon, official Chinese media acknowledged that the rocket would fail to reach orbit—and abruptly ended the broadcast.

Had the mission been a success, the next launch for the Long March 5 rocket, planned for late 2017, would have carried the Chang’e-5 spacecraft. That mission would do something not attempted in more than four decades: land on the moon, collect samples, and return them to Earth. Those plans are now on hold and will perhaps remain so until 2019. But China still promises to make significant advances in its long-term lunar ambitions in 2018 by making the first-ever landing on the moon’s far side.

Chang’e-5 is the latest in an incremental series of lunar missions flown by China over the past decade, each building on the achievements of the previous ones. (“Chang’e” is the name of the Chinese goddess of the moon.)

“The Chang’e program includes three steps,” said Xiao Long, a lunar scientist at the China University of Geosciences, during a meeting of the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group in Maryland in October. “One is orbiting, the second is landing, and the third one is sample return.”

Chang’e-1, launched in October 2007, was China’s first lunar-orbiter mission. “It was very successful,” said Xiao, providing a variety of scientific data and allowing for the construction of a global map of the moon to support future lander missions.

Chang’e-2, built as a backup to Chang’e-1, lifted off three years later. With updated scientific instruments, it collected more data about the moon, then used its thrusters to leave lunar orbit, flying by the near-Earth asteroid Toutatis in 2012.

In December 2013, China moved on to the second planned step with the landing of Chang’e-3. That made China the third country after the United States and the former Soviet Union to successfully soft-land a spacecraft on the moon. The lander carried a suite of instruments as well as a small rover, called Yutu, or “Jade Rabbit.”

A little more than a month after landing, Yutu suffered a malfunction that immobilized it, although it was still able to make observations in place. China has published only a limited analysis of the data collected by Chang’e-3, but Xiao said that one of the lander’s instruments, a ground-penetrating radar, was particularly useful in probing the lunar subsurface.

With the first two steps accomplished, China is eager to move on to step 3: sample return. Prior to the July launch failure, China’s space agency, the China National Space Administration (CNSA), planned to go directly to Chang’e-5, rather than launch Chang’e-4, the backup lander mission. Chang’e-5 would first go into orbit around the moon before a lander module separated and touched down in Oceanus Procellarum, the large dark area on the western half of the moon’s near side.

In addition to various scientific instruments, the lander has a robotic arm, intended to grab up to 2 kilograms of lunar rock and soil samples. Those samples will be placed inside a capsule that is then launched into orbit around the moon. That capsule will dock with the orbiter part of the spacecraft, which will then boost it out of lunar orbit and back to Earth, landing in Inner Mongolia. If successful, Chang’e-5 would return the first samples from the moon since the Soviet Union’s Luna 24 mission in 1976.

If that July mission had met its goals, another Long March 5 rocket might have launched Chang’e-5 as soon as November, with samples returning to Earth two weeks later. Now, it’s not clear when the sample-return mission will go.

Tian Yulong, secretary general of CNSA, discussed the status of the mission at the recent International Astronautical Congress, a major annual space conference held last year in September in Adelaide, Australia. He said that the cause of the Long March 5 failure was still unknown. And he acknowledged that Chang’e-5 would be delayed, perhaps for an extended period. “By the end of [2017] we will have some detailed information” about the revised schedule, he said.

Photos, Top: Wang Jianmin/Xinhua/Alamy; Bottom: Zhang Wenjun/Xinhua/Getty Images

Moon Shot: China’s Long March 5 rocket [bottom photo] will be used for a lunar sample-return mission, expanding on what was accomplished by the lander China put on the moon in 2013 [top].

Many experts following China’s space program predict that Chang’e-5 will be delayed until 2019. That’s because it’ll take time for the investigation to determine the cause of the failure and then for the work needed to remedy the problem. And they expect China to perform at least one launch of the vehicle, if not more, before officials feel confident enough about it for a mission as significant as Chang’e-5. “After one or two successful launches, then Chang’e-5 will go. That’s my guess,” said Xiao.

The extended delay in Chang’e-5, though, doesn’t mean China’s lunar exploration program will grind to a halt this year. Chang’e-4, the backup to Chang’e-3, may still launch in 2018 because it can use a different rocket, one not affected by the Long March 5 accident.

Chang’e-4 would be similar to the 2013 Chang’e-3 mission—with one important exception: The spacecraft would be the first by any country to attempt a landing on the far side of the moon. Because the landing site is out of view from Earth—and thus out of radio contact with it—Chang’e-4 will need a dedicated communications relay satellite in lunar orbit. With it, the lander may be able to shed light on the intriguing nature of the far side, which lacks extensive maria. These “seas,” vast volcanic plains of dark basaltic rock, are prominent features of the near side.

At the International Astronautical Congress, CNSA’s Tian didn’t indicate when Chang’e-4 would launch, saying only that its schedule would be adjusted along with that of Chang’e-5. But Xiao believes the communications relay satellite needed for the far-side mission will launch in mid-2018, followed by the Chang’e-4 lander—again carrying a small rover—late in the year.

China’s plans for lunar exploration don’t end with Chang’e-5, no matter when it might launch. Just as China developed backup orbiters and landers, there is a backup sample-return mission, Chang’e-6, that could fly later.

Chang’e-6, Xiao said, might go to the lunar poles, an area of interest both to scientists and to those planning future human missions to the moon. Craters near the poles—including those in the giant South Pole–Aitken basin on the far side—have regions that remain perpetually in shadow because of the moon’s very small axial tilt. Those spots are cold enough to preserve water ice indefinitely, and some past missions have detected strong evidence of ice in those craters. Future human missions could use that water for life support as well as for fuel, by breaking it down into hydrogen and oxygen.

Even if Chang’e-6 lands elsewhere—or does not launch at all—China plans to study the lunar poles in detail in the 2020s. A series of three missions, including landers and sample-return spacecraft, will study the moon’s polar regions, Xiao said.

China is not alone in its interest in the poles of the moon. Russia has a series of four missions under development for launch from 2019 through 2024, including lander and sample-return missions to the lunar poles. NASA is also working on a lunar rover called Resource Prospector, designed to confirm that water ice exists in those shadowed craters and to study how difficult it is to extract. Current plans call for that mission to launch in the early 2020s.

China’s longer-term plans include human missions to the moon but are without much in the way of details. “The goal is to establish a research station,” Xiao said, sometime between 2025 and 2050.

China’s overall lunar exploration plan has earned the endorsement of one major American lunar scientist. “Their program is extremely robust,” said James Head of Brown University, who has been involved in lunar missions since the Apollo program.

Head visited China recently and came away impressed with the country’s commitment to lunar exploration. “There’s a lot of excitement about this program,” he said. “There’s historically not been a major lunar and planetary science community in China, but in the last decade or so it’s been growing.”

China’s interest in and capabilities for lunar exploration create opportunities for international cooperation. And the Chinese government has indeed shown itself open for that: Four of the instruments on the Chang’e-4 lander come from other countries: one each from Germany, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, and Sweden.

But cooperation between the United States and China in space is complicated by U.S. law. For the past several years, Congress has included provisions in the bills funding NASA that prohibit the space agency from cooperating with China without explicit prior approval from Congress. That restriction is based on fears by some in Congress about the theft of intellectual property or other security risks if NASA were to engage with China.

There are other hurdles as well. Head had invited Yu Guobin, vice director of the Lunar and Space Exploration Engineering Center of China, to speak at a conference in the United States last year. Yu accepted, but the U.S. embassy rejected his visa application shortly before he was to fly to the United States. Head said Yu was never given the reason his visa application was denied, and other Chinese scientists attending the conference had no such problems. (The U.S. embassy declined to comment to IEEE Spectrum about why it rejected Yu’s visa application.)

Head said the benefits of cooperation with China in lunar exploration outweigh any perceived security risks. “I worked with the Soviet Union and Russia for 45 years, and I’m here to tell you that you have to be very careful with technological transfer and other national security issues,” he said. “Nonetheless, there’s much to be gained from cooperation and collaboration.”

He’s hopeful that China and the United States will eventually be able to work more closely to explore the moon, both with robots and with people. “We would be derelict in our duty for the future if we did not emphasize that this is an international endeavor,” Head said. “It’s in all of our best interests to do what we can to share the scientific knowledge from these missions.”

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The spacecraft graveyard

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The spacecraft graveyard

Image copyright china manned space engineering

Image caption China’s Tiangong I spacecraft is expected to fall to Earth soon

China’s Tiangong-1 space station is currently out of control and expected to fall back to Earth next year. But not in the remote place where many other spacecraft end their days.

Explorers and adventurers often look for new places to conquer now that the highest peaks have been climbed, the poles reached and vast oceans and deserts crossed.

Some of these new places are called the poles of inaccessibility. Two of them are particularly interesting.

One is called the continental pole of inaccessibility – it’s the place on Earth furthest from the ocean. There is some debate as to its exact position but it’s considered by many to be near the so-called Dzungarian Gate – a mountain pass between China and Central Asia.

The equivalent point in the ocean – the place furthest away from land – lies in the South Pacific some 2,700km (1,680 miles) south of the Pitcairn Islands – somewhere in the no-man’s land, or rather no-man’s-sea, between Australia, New Zealand and South America.

This oceanic pole of inaccessibility is not only of interest to explorers, satellite operators are interested in it as well. That’s because most of the satellites placed in orbit around the Earth will eventually come down, but where?

Smaller satellites will burn up but pieces of the larger ones will survive to reach the Earth’s surface. To avoid crashing on a populated area they are brought down near the point of oceanic inaccessibility.

Scattered over an area of approximately 1,500 sq km (580 sq miles) on the ocean floor of this region is a graveyard of satellites. At last count there were more than 260 of them, mostly Russian.

The wreckage of the Mir space station lies there. It was launched in 1986 and was visited by many teams of cosmonauts and international visitors.

With a mass of 120 tonnes it was never going to burn up in the atmosphere, so it was ditched in the region in 2001 and was seen by some fishermen as a fragmenting mass of glowing debris racing across the sky.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A computer-simulated image of Mir’s descent and break-up as it entered the Earth’s atmosphere in 2001

Many times a year the supply module that goes to the International Space Station burns up in this region incinerating the station’s waste.

No one is in any danger because of this controlled re-entry into our atmosphere. The region is not fished because oceanic currents avoid the area and do not bring nutrients to it, making marine life scarce.

One future visitor to this desolate place will be the International Space Station.

Current plans are for it to be decommissioned in the next decade and it will have to be carefully brought down in the oceanic pole of inaccessibility. With a mass of 450 tonnes – four times that of the Mir space station – it will make a spectacular sight.

Sometimes however, it’s not possible to bring a satellite or space station down in the South Pacific if ground controllers have lost contact with it.

Image copyright NASA

Image caption The Earth is surrounded by thousands of pieces of space junk (dots not to scale)

Such a thing happened with the 36-tonne Salyut 7 space station in 1991 which came down in South America or the American Skylab that struck Australia in 1979. No one on the ground was injured, or indeed as far as we know, ever has been by a piece of falling spacecraft debris.

We will face that problem again next year.

Between January and April the Chinese Tiangong-1 will come back to Earth. It was launched in 2011 as China’s first space station. The following year it was visited by China’s first female astronaut, Liu Yang.

Tiangong-1’s orbit is decaying as it heads towards re-entry. But Chinese engineers have lost control of it and cannot fire its thrusters to bring it down in the South Pacific.

Instead it will come down somewhere between 42.8 degrees north and south. That’s between the latitude of northern Spain and southern Australia, and we won’t be able to be more precise than that until just a few hours before it burns up.

Tiangong-1 is one space station that probably won’t join its companions in the remote South Pacific.

Dr David Whitehouse was the BBC’s science correspondent from 1988 until 2006, and is a former science editor at the BBC News website.

Original Article:

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[tediousoscars]

2016

Predict-o-meter: This year: 7/8; Total: 87/103 (84%)

It is not that unusual for a movie to get nominated that I had absolutely no interest in seeing and so have to drag myself to. It doesn’t happen every year, but typically no more that 3 or 4 years go by without it happening. Sometimes I am pleasantly surprised and end up loving the film (“The Social Network”), but more typically my worst fears are confirmed (“War Horse,” almost everything by Scorsese). However, I can’t recall a single year in which TWO movies were nominated that elicited not the slightest interest in me. Until this year. This year there were THREE. And while one of them did prove to be a pleasant surprise, the other two decidedly did not. I won’t say which ones, but see if you can tell from the reviews.

But before we get started we have to stop for a moment to give a shout out to Janelle Monáe and Mahershala Ali, who appear together in not one, but TWO films nominated for Best Picture: “Hidden Figures” and “Moonlight.” And while Mahershala was nominated for his strong work in “Moonlight,” it was Janelle who almost stole the show in “Hidden Figures.” Kudos!

Now let’s get to it.

- THE CONTENDERS -

Fences. Two towering performances from Denzel Washington and Viola Davis (both nominated - though how Davis’ role could be construed as Supporting rather than Leading is beyond me) are the pillars holding this wonderful film aloft. Set in 1950s Pittsburgh, “Fences” is the story of Troy Maxson (Washington), who is an extremely complicated man. Wracked by guilt over surviving on a pension his brother receives after suffering a head wound in the war that left him severely mentally challenged, frustrated over being a baseball star in the Negro Leagues just a few years before Jackie Robinson, and infuriated over the racism that holds a black ex-con down, there is a hardness about him that is undeniable. He says that the only good thing that ever happened to him was his wife Rose (Davis). But he is also an entertainingly loquacious storyteller, whom his best friend says must have a bit of Uncle Remus in him. Troy is an emotional storm with gale-force winds and churning seas. But Rose is the steadfast lighthouse, unflinching in the face of the tumult, always providing a beacon. Washington, who was also nominated for his directing, nicely captures the claustrophobia of the stage-play source material. Most of the action occurs in the two small downstairs rooms of their modest home, or in the backyard that is little more than a patio. We are exploring inner landscapes here. Troy’s snappy patter is entertaining enough to justify the price of admission, but the nuanced exploration of life and love, human strength and weakness, desire and motivation make this a masterpiece.

Hell or High Water. Part modern-day Western, part caper movie, part film noir, this movie is rollicking good fun. The Howard brothers are on a bank-robbing spree. With a purpose. They are robbing very specific banks to raise a very specific amount of money for a very specific reason. Because they only clear a few thousand dollars each time, and all of the banks are in the same state (Texas) the Feds have no interest in the case. So it falls to crusty old Marcus Hamilton, a Texas Ranger stereotypically weeks from retirement, and his half-Mexican, half-Indian partner Alberto Parker to run them to ground. Sounds simple, right? And it could have been, but Taylor Sheridan’s (nominated) screenplay is too smart for that. Ben Foster is sublime in the role of Tanner Howard, the ne’er-do-well, hell-raising ex-con brawn to brother Toby Howard’s brains. Tanner is a fuck up, and he knows it, but he is addicted to the adrenaline rush of the outlaw lifestyle. He sees this caper as his last chance to do something good (while still raising hell) by helping brother Toby (played by Chris Pine) save their father’s ranch and the newly-discovered oil there-under. Jeff Bridges was nominated for his role as Ranger Hamilton, which is essentially a reprisal of his role in “True Grit.” In fact, it is easy to imagine that Ranger Hamilton is the great grandson of Rooster Cogburn. The brothers’ scheme is ingenious, and hinges upon an epic (if not heroic) last stand by Tanner, and the coda in which Bridges’ Hamilton confronts Pine’s Toby to say that he knows Toby did it, but can’t prove it is pure bridled machismo.

Hidden Figures. There was a time, not that long ago, when the word ‘computer’ referred to a person, as in ‘someone who computes.’ During the early days of the space race, as an increasingly nervous America watched as Russia put first a satellite, then a dog, then a man into space, NASA employed quite a number of computers to check and re-check the calculations needed to determine the trajectories of spacecraft. These computers tended to be women, who today would be engineers, but at the time had no such option. And amongst these women were a cadre of ~20-30 black women stationed at Langley in Virginia, which at the time in the early 60s was still a segregated state. “Hidden Figures” is the triumphant story of these women and the incredible obstacles they had to overcome. The film focuses on three real-life figures: Mary Jackson (played by Janelle Monáe), a budding engineer, Dorothy Vaughn (Octavia Spencer in a nominated roled), who became an early specialist in the machines we now call computers, and particularly Katherine Johnson (played by Taraji Henson). The Space Task Group is charged with properly calculating the launch and (crucially) re-entry parameters for orbital human spaceflight. It is a pressure cooker run by a demanding taskmaster with a reputation of burning through computers on an almost weekly basis. When a need arises for an expertise in analytic geometry the East Area Computers (the white girls) have no suitable candidate, so they ask the ‘colored’ girls of the West Area Computers for help. Enter Katherine Johnson. She takes on the job with a brilliant mind and an indomitable spirit. She is clearly the smartest person in the room, and yet she has to run a half-mile across campus back to the West Area to use the bathroom because that’s the only place that has ‘colored’ rest rooms. In a bit of poetic justice near the end of the film, a white male engineer must make the same sprint to find her because John Glenn has demanded that Katherine personally verify the re-entry calculations after the IBM machine that replaced her delivered inconsistent results. This movie has indomitable human spirit, unbridled American patriotism (that refreshingly has nothing to do with war), and, of course, sharp lessons on Civil Rights history all wrapped up in a package that is just good, clean fun. You should really stop whatever it is you are doing right now and go see this film.

Lion. Like all little brothers, 5yo Saroo idolizes his older brother Gudu. They eke out a hardscrabble existence with their mother and baby sister in the back of beyond of rural India. They are desperately poor, and they know it, but they have a loving family and are generally happy. While trying to tag along with Gudu on his night job, Saroo becomes locked in an empty passenger car on a train being relocated cross country without stopping. Two days and 750 miles later, he is in the urban bustle of Calcutta, which might as well be a different planet since few people speak his native Hindi. After some harrowing adventures he winds up in an orphanage where he is adopted by a loving and earnest middle-class couple in Tasmania. Fast-forward 25 years, and the adult Saroo is seemingly well-adjusted and integrated into his adopted culture. While at a party at the house of some Indian friends he happens across a plate of jalebis, a dessert he had craved as a child but could never afford. This triggers a flood of memories from his lost childhood and launches him on an all-consuming and ultimately successful quest to find his birth mother. “Lion” is a wonderful film based on an amazing true story. And while it could have been a simple, manipulative tear-jerker, director Garth Davis delivers a film with impressive emotional complexity. Sunny Pawar is amazing as the young Saroo, and Dev Patel was nominated for his role as the adult Saroo, as was Nicole Kidman - in her native accent! - for her role as Sue, Saroo’s adoptive Australian mother. You’ll enjoy this long, harrowing journey, but keep your hanky handy for the eventual reunion between mother and son.

Moonlight. This is a coming-of-age story set in a world that John Hughes never imagined. If you had to sum up Chiron (aka “Little,” aka “Black”) in one word, that word would be ‘awkward.’ Growing up in a rough part of Miami with a missing father and a (literal) crack whore mother (Naomie Harris in a nominated role), bullied at school and unwelcome at home, 9yo Little’s life is characterized by constant fear, stress, and uncertainty. Little is sullen and withdrawn; the only kid who seems to understand him is Kevin, a breezy charmer, and the only remotely positive father figure he has is Juan (Mahershala Ali, also nominated), a crack dealer with a kind girlfriend who sort of unofficially adopts him. Fast-forward to the painfully awkward high school teen years: he now tries to go by his given name, Chiron, but has been dubbed Black by Kevin. Juan has been killed (though his girlfriend Teresa still lets Chiron crash when his mother has “company”), and the bullies are still omnipresent. To this point the film is not characterized so much by action, but rather by the seething, building tension associated with trying to constantly avoid action. Something’s gotta give. After a fumbling (dare I say awkward?) sexual encounter with Kevin the bullies force Kevin to beat Chiron up. This is the catalyst that causes Chiron to snap, leading to the sort of violent retributive outburst that makes movie audiences cheer, but lands young black men in jail. Fast-forward a decade. Now an adult, he has emerged from prison, moved to Atlanta, and adopted the persona – and the pimped-out ride – of Juan, and embraced Kevin’s nickname for him, Black. We see him making the rounds to check on his subordinate pushers and working out to maintain his thug life body. He is still sullen and withdrawn, but hard. This all changes with an unexpected phone call from Kevin, whom he hasn’t heard from since leaving Miami. In a truly breath-taking piece of acting, Trevante Rhodes – as the adult Black – brilliantly captures the mannerisms and even the intonations of the younger actors who play Little (Alex R. Hibbert) and Chiron (Ashton Sanders). We see a hardened criminal pick up the phone, but as soon as he hears Kevin’s voice subtle changes sweep over his face and he reverts – unconsciously and unintentionally – to the troubled, awkward youth he was. It is an Oscar-worthy performance, but unfortunately he does not get enough screen time to warrant a nomination. Overall this is a difficult film, but it is finely crafted, almost painfully heartfelt, and presents such a unique perspective that it is definitely worth the investment.

- THE PRETENDERS -

Arrival. This is a refreshing new take on the “alien invasion” genre. What is most unique is the aliens’ motivation behind their arrival, which I won’t give away but is fascinating. In fact, it’s difficult to discuss the plot at all without spoilers, but I will say that it’s timey wimey enough for the most ardent Doctor Who fan. Most of this movie is very well done. The aliens are extremely alien (Director Denis Villeneuve (nominated) understands that your imagination is always more frightening than reality, so he keeps his aliens shrouded in a thick fog and only fleetingly, partially visible) while the humans are annoyingly human (there’s a pretty standard schism between the “let’s talk to them” faction and the “blow them up” faction). An overall tone of realism is maintained so that the disbelief that must be willingly suspended is minimized, and the always-wonderful Amy Adams departs from her quirky, perky safezone to deliver a solid performance as a serious scientist. I do have a quibble, however. The entire plot of the film revolves around the written language of the aliens, which is so complex it seems almost magical. But the way in which the humans decipher it is given short shrift. There is boundless opportunity here for dramatic tension with the scientists making furtive steps, false starts, and brilliant breakthroughs, but it just sort of … happens. There’s not even a montage of long hours hunched over a computer or scribbling on a white board. Though this seems like a tragically missed opportunity it should not prevent you from enjoying this film that breathes new life into a fairly tired old genre.

Hacksaw Ridge. This is an extremely mediocre movie about an extremely fascinating and compelling true story. Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield in a nominated role) was the first conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor for his efforts as an unarmed medic during the battle of Okinawa in WWII. After confronting his drunken father (who was beating his mother) with a pistol, Desmond makes a promise to God to never touch a gun again. This conviction is challenged when his patriotism compels Desmond to enlist after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Despite his intentions of being a medic his superior officers try to force Desmond to train with a rifle during basic training. His steadfast refusal leads to hazing, beatings, and nearly lands him in prison. He is eventually allowed to serve, and after his battalion is chased off the titular ridge Doss remains behind alone and drags 75 wounded men to safety while constantly dodging enemy soldiers. The problem with the film is that every aspect is hyper-romanticized, from the rough-housing of the Doss brothers as boys, to the too-cute-by-half courtship of Desmond and his wife-to-be. Even the drunken excesses of his father seem cliche and rote. The Japanese are depicted as unstoppable killing machines with neither souls nor honor (who knew director Mel Gibson (nominated) had issues with racial stereotypes?) and the battle scenes are shot in operatic slow motion in which even the blood and the mud are made to look Just Right. Garfield’s turn as Doss is strong, but I’m not sure it’s Oscar-worthy, and there are also a couple strong performances by actors playing against type: Hugo Weaving is convincingly tortured as the drunken father, and Vince Vaughn is surprisingly good as the obligatory tough-as-nails sergeant. Overall the film is watchable and the story is almost strong enough to overcome the directorial flaws. But not quite.

La La Land. This is a starry-eyed love letter to Los Angeles, both the physical city and the dreams of success and stardom that inhabit it. The story is engaging and well-crafted, the sumptuous cinematography makes it look as though the entire film was shot during the Golden Hour, and the acting is superb. The scenes in which Emma Stone – as struggling actress Mia – auditions for various roles are tours de force. The film is also an adoring homage to the MGM musicals of the 50s, and herein lies the problem: Stone and co-star Ryan Gosling can’t sing or dance. I mean, they’re not tone deaf and club-footed or anything, but neither of them could make the chorus line of the worst show on Broadway. The singing is at the level of a high school musical (no, not “High School Musical”), and as for dancing, if they were on Dancing with the Stars they would not be expected to survive past the third episode. But no one seems to care! I even read one review that claimed that this was a clever choice because their characters aren’t stars … yet! Excuse me, but generally talent leads to fame, not the other way around. It’s a shame because there really is a lot to love about this movie. If you can overlook this (glaring, obvious) flaw you will really enjoy it. But that thumping sound you’ll hear is Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers whirling dervishly in their graves.

Manchester by the Sea. We are introduced to Lee Chandler as a socially-maladapted loaner with anger management issues. Severe anger management issues. As the story unfolds we learn through flashbacks that Lee - played with understated intensity by Casey Affleck (nominated) - was once the epitome of the happily-married, blue-collar father, until tragedy struck. Unimaginable, life-shattering tragedy. That is the past, which informs the present, but the current tragedy is the sudden - but not totally unexpected - death of Lee’s brother Joe from a congenital heart condition. This leaves Lee as the guardian of his 16yo nephew, Patrick, a role for which (he is self-aware enough to understand) he is completely unsuited. What follows is an hour or so of stressful bickering as two guys who have suffered loss and who have feelings that they can’t comprehend, much less express, try to live together. In the end Lee manages to extract himself from the situation more or less gracefully, and return to his previous life. Still socially-maladapted, still a loner, but perhaps with slightly less severe anger management issues. The film is well acted, director Kenneth Lonergan (nominated) manages the pacing and the flashbacks skillfully, and the muted lighting captures the quiet desperation of New England in winter perfectly. But Lee’s character does not move an inch through the narrative: he is exactly the same person at the beginning and end of the film. And the film’s central tenet - that blue-collar guys in New England are not in touch with their feelings - is hardly revelatory.

So which SHOULD win?

I really loved all of the films in the Contenders category above, but Hidden Figures stands out as the one that not only elicited the most complex emotional response, but also the only one that I really want to watch again. Seriously go see it.

But which WILL win?

Though it boggles my mind, La La Land looks like a shoo-in for Best Picture. I really just don’t get it. Moonlight is a dark horse here, but is running a very distant second.

Best Actress - Emma Stone for La La Land. Note that it isn’t for Best Singer.

Best Actor - This is an interesting race between Casey Affleck for Manchester by the Sea and Denzel Washington for Fences. In my mind Denzel gave a much stronger performance with much greater emotional range, but I think Casey Affleck will win.

Best Supporting Actress - Viola Davis wins going away for Fences. Well deserved.

Best Supporting Actor - Mahershala Ali for Moonlight.

Best Director - Damien Chazelle for La La Land. I mean, the DIRECTION didn’t suck.

Best Adapted Screenplay - Look for Moonlight to squeak in here.

Best Cinematography - La La Land. This is probably the only category that it actually deserves to win. It is gorgeous.

And that’s all I have time for because I am so late! Until next year …

[lethaderr-blog]

Here are the best things to do in southern for active and outdoor adventurers.

It was my first time visiting the state of and I really didn’t know what to expect. I was in town for the Women in Travel Summit conference (WITS), and it was a great excuse to check a new state off my bucket list. After spending some time in Portland, it was time to venture away from the city. As I had my own car, I had the freedom to go wherever I wanted. Yes, this crazy road trip warrior drove solo on a 10 hour trip from Toronto to Portland. After making this journey, I feel like I can own the term “road trip warrior” and also the “crazy” part of the title, too (though I did break up the drive into manageable chunks).

Anyway, after my time at WITS, I headed south to check out the southern coast on a trip with The Beaches. There are lots of things to do in southern for outdoor adventure enthusiasts. I had the opportunity to check out several exciting places for those wanting to get outside, explore nature, or try a new activity. While there are many attractions in York County, I’ll break up this itinerary by city, starting from south in Kittery to north in Kennebunkport. While you won’t see any beaches on this itinerary, this listing of things to do in southern can be enjoyed from spring right through to the fall.

SOUTHERN MAINE TRAVEL GUIDE

WHERE TO STAY IN THE MAINE BEACHES REGION: I loved staying at The Dunes on the Waterfront in Ogunquit. You can read my review a little further down on this page. Book your stay at The Dunes or read more reviews by fellow travelers. While I highly recommend staying at The Dunes, you can also choose to browse the available listings on Airbnb if you’re looking for a shared room or your own home. Here are some more hotels in The Beaches.

GETTING AROUND SOUTHERN MAINE: I recommend having access to a car when you visit The Beaches. A lot of the places on this particular itinerary are far apart from one another. Having a car makes this trip possible. If you don’t have your own, consider renting a car for this trip.

MORE THINGS TO DO IN MAINE: For all of the best things to do in New York State, check out all of my other blog posts.

PHOTOS OF THE MAINE BEACHES REGION: Check out our entire photo album of pictures from southern to inspire your trip. You can also purchase prints, housewares, and all sorts of gifts made from any of our photos – just click the “buy” button on any picture.

Kittery

Let’s start just about as far south as we can go in the state of : Kittery. The town of Kittery is just across a bridge from Portsmouth, New Hampshire. While Kittery might be known for its outlet shopping, I headed straight to one of the most unique things to do on the coast of .

Take Flight Aerial Park

The aerial adventures and ziplines at Take Flight are one of the most thrilling things to do in southern . Strap on your harness and helmet, we’re going on an adventure! I experienced the Aerial Challenge Course and it was exhilarating, demanding, and even a little bit scary at times. With that said, you can choose how much or little to challenge yourself. It’s an epic journey for kids and adults alike. 

The adventure course at Take Flight is a place to climb, swing, and hang around, quite literally. It’s perfect for all abilities, even if you’ve never done a ropes course before. You’ll need to visit with a partner as the course operates on a buddy system where you’ll be responsible for the safety of your partner (and vice versa). There are over 65 elements on the adventure course, including cargo nets, bridges, swinging tires, various platforms, ropes, and all sorts of inventive materials to swing around on.

Some of these are easier to figure out than others. It’s quite simple to realize that you need to climb through a cargo net. But, you might encounter a set of buoys suspended in the air and wonder, “how the heck am I going to get across this?” It’s all part of the fun. I found myself laughing over and over again with the antics I seemed to get myself into on this course.

There are three levels of apparatus and swinging platforms that you’ll encounter. You can choose just how high you want to go and which bridges to cross. When my travel buddy, Retha and I got to a certain spot that was a little too intimidating, we’d exclaim something like, “Oh hell, no!” and choose an alternate route. And then there were other moments where a set of swings looked rather daring and we’d give it a shot. In the end, I felt quite pleased and accomplished that I’d attempted the adventure course. Take Flight is one of the best southern attractions, and I urge you to check it out with one of your friends.

When you visit the Take Flight adventure course, you’ll be able to climb around for a maximum of 2 hours. You’ll receive a “pre-flight” training to prepare you for the excursion. Wear sneakers, sunscreen, and sunglasses. Don’t bring your camera, phone, or anything else with you. Take Flight staff members will take photos of you, so you don’t need to worry about damaging your gear on the course. Thank you so much to the staff at Take Flight for taking these photos of us!

York

Next, we drive a little bit up the road to York where you can find an excellent place to hit the trails. Some of the best hiking in southern is at Mount Agamenticus. My second stop in York isn’t really an outdoor adventure per se, but a beautiful scenic location to view the Nubble Lighthouse.

Mount Agamenticus

If there’s one place where you need to go hiking in southern , it’s Mount Agamenticus. Known as “Mount A” for short, the Mount Agamenticus Conservation Region sprawls across 10,000 acres within a 30,000 acre section of conservation land in southern . In fact, the region surrounding Mount A makes up one of the largest unfragmented forests in coastal New England. Within this unique coastal forest, you’ll find the highest diversity of plant and animal species in the whole state. You might spot whitetail deer, moose, spotted turtles, black racer snakes, or even a black bear. I didn’t manage to see any wildlife this time around, but you never know what you might see on the trail.

Mount A also happens to be one of ’s best sites to watch migrating raptors, including peregrine falcons, bald eagles, osprey, and hawks. In the fall, you can see hundreds of birds migrating within a few hours from the summit. On average, 4000 raptors migrate through this location annually. Make sure you visit Mount Agamenticus in late September through mid October on a clear day with a strong northwest wind.

The trails surrounding Mount A are perfect for hikers, bikers, and even winter activities like snowshoeing. Along with a local guide, we started at the bottom of Mount A and hiked up to the top. It’s a very gradual incline, so it’s not terribly challenging. However, it’s a great location for sightseeing and spending a few hours in nature. There are numerous informative plaques along the way about the history of the region, as well as the kinds of trees you’ll come across on your journey. 

Eventually, you’ll reach the summit of Mount A, which is also directly accessible by car. At the summit, there are several interesting features and lookouts. You can soak up views of the mountains in one direction, including Mount Washington on a clear day. From another vantage point, you can see right out to the Atlantic Ocean. There’s a circular deck at the middle of the summit with miniatures of various nearby attractions like Nubble Light and Goose Rocks Beach. Be sure to wander around this vast expanse of land to the various lookout decks and rocky ledges.

Nubble Light

Even though this isn’t technically an outdoor adventure, you really should go to see Nubble Light when you’re in York. You can actually see Nubble Light from Mount A, too! It’s a quick drive down to the ocean to view this beautiful southern lighthouse. Officially named Cape Neddick Light, the lighthouse sits on Nubble Island, about 100 meters off Cape Neddick Point. While the lighthouse itself is inaccessible to the general public, you can easily view it from the edge of Cape Neddick Point. There’s a big parking lot, so you can pull right up and take a look. Going to see Nubble Light is one of the most iconic things to do on the coast of .

Built in 1879, the lighthouse is 41 feet tall but is positioned 88 feet above sea level. It sits up on top of a high, rocky island. Nubble Light is still in use today. It’s a classic example of an American lighthouse. A picture of the Nubble Light is included on the Voyager spacecraft, along with examples of other famous man made structures like the Great Wall of China and the Taj Mahal.

Ogunquit

Ogunquit has some of the most stunning views that I’ve seen throughout my time in . I recommend that you take a drive over to Perkins Cove to explore this little village. You can also access Marginal Way from this starting point.

Marginal Way

The Marginal Way is a spectacular coastal walk on the Atlantic Ocean. The paved path winds along the cliffs, allowing you to get right up close to the crashing waves. The name refers to the “margin” between the land and the sea. There are 39 benches placed on this 1.25 mile trek, and it’s a very easy walk. With very little effort, there’s a big reward of the beautiful views every moment along the way. While it’s more walking than hiking in southern , I’d definitely add this one to your list of southern attractions. It’s my one of my favorite things to do in southern . Plus, once you’re finished walking the Marginal Way, you can explore the rest of Perkins Cove.

Perkins Cove

Perkins Cove is a small village by the sea in Ogunquit. There are a few boutiques, restaurants, and cafes. Unfortunately, if you visit a little too early in the spring like I did (at the start of May), many things could be closed for the season. Many areas in southern are seasonal and open primarily throughout the summer months when the tourists flock to the beaches. However, it’s still a lovely spot to visit, even if many businesses are closed for the season. I loved walking around this peaceful place after my walk on the Marginal Way. 

The focal point of Perkins Cove is the Perkins Cove Drawbridge. It is a historic, wooden footbridge that overlooks the lovely harbor. The Perkins Cove Drawbridge might be one of the only double leaf footbridges left in the United States. It is still in use today to allow tall boats to enter the harbor. While the harbormaster controls the bridge, sometimes it’s up to the average person to control the drawbridge if he isn’t around at that moment. There’s a button on the bridge itself that controls it. The bridge didn’t need to be raised while I was there, but I imagine it’s pretty fun to watch the bridge in action (especially if you get to be the lucky one to push the button!).

Kennebunk

Did you know that there’s nowhere else in the world called Kennebunk except for this village in ? Well, it’s not as though I imagined there was another ‘Kennebunk’ in the world, as it’s such a unique name. But, the residents want to make sure that you know that. There’s a sign on the entrance to town stating: “Welcome to Kennebunk, the only village in the world so named.” So, there you have it. I recommend taking a walk around town as it’s super adorable. 

Garden Street Bowl

I know that a bowling alley is not exactly an outdoor adventure. But, it’s a lot of fun after a day of being outdoors, and it’s also a great rainy day activity in southern . Grab your friends and head straight to Garden Street Bowl for an enjoyable evening in Kennebunk. The building is actually an old grocery store, renovated and repurposed into a bowling alley, tap house, restaurant, and games room.

You can order food and drink directly to your bowling lane or feel free to sit at the restaurant or bar. There are 27 taps featuring craft beers and kombucha, and there’s also a wine list. I’ll write a little bit more about the food under the “Where to Eat” heading of this blog post. Once you’re done bowling, head over to the games section, which is set up in the old area of the grocery store where they stored the shopping carts. You can play arcade games, corn hole, bocce ball, skee ball and pinball! Garden Street Bowl is open seven days a week until 11pm (12am on Friday and Saturday). It’s one of the best things to do in southern after a day of outdoor adventures.

Kennebunkport

Down by the sea near Kennebunk, you’ll find the village of Kennebunkport. This is a great place to go for a scenic walk around town. Check out the port village, the sailboats in the harbor, and stroll all over town for glimpses into a relaxed coastal lifestyle. Besides stopping for a coffee, I didn’t necessarily do anything in Kennebunkport. Simply wandering around is sometimes as equally as enjoyable as any activity when you’re traveling!

Scenic Flight of the Coast

And now for what was quite possibly my favorite thing to do in southern – a scenic flight! Hop aboard a small plane that seats only four people (including the pilot). It’s an incredibly unique vacation experience and a fabulous way to view every landmark you just visited from up above. A discovery flight with Southern Aviation can be anywhere from a half hour to two hours in length. You’ll be in excellent hands with a skilled pilot (ours was a former American Airlines pilot with over 25 years of experience). 

Flying Over Southern

You can choose your flight path or let your pilot decide. We left it up to the hands of the professional, and he took us right over the southern coast. From up above, we saw Ogunquit, Wells Beach, York Harbor, Kennebunkport, Nubble Light, and traveled all the way down to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The scenery looked absolutely amazing from up in the plane. I loved gazing at the patterns in the sand dunes. It was delightful to see the various colors of the water and the treetops from overhead. 

If you’re interested in taking a scenic flight in , head straight to the Sanford Airport (14 miles west of Kennebunk). You can even take flying lessons at the airport if you live nearby or you’re enjoying an extended stay in . This discovery flight actually counts as your first lesson towards earning your pilot’s license. If you’re like me and you’d rather leave the flying up to the pros, I was surprised at just how affordable it was to take a private plane up in the air. It only costs $195 per hour, which can be split between up to 3 passengers.

Where to Eat

Looking for vegan food in southern ? Plant-based eats are really easy to find in Portland as there are several vegan and vegan-friendly establishments. However, in southern (especially in the off season), it’s a little more difficult. Not to worry, I never starve – there’s always a way to find yummy vegan food. Let me share my top picks for vegan eats in southern .

Squeeze

The Squeeze is a juice bar in Kittery, . In fact, it’s a juice bar inside an old drive thru bank stand. This small stall is repurposed into a juice cafe, and they serve up so many delicious smoothies and smoothie bowls. You really can’t go wrong with an acai bowl. I tried the Bananarama after a long hike, excluding the yogurt, because it includes espresso. Yum!

Heckman’s Pub at Nonantum Resort

If you’re looking for casual dining options or maybe just a pint of craft beer, head to Heckman’s Pub in Kennebunkport. It’s inside the Nonantum Resort, but you don’t need to stay at the hotel to dine there. I recommend ordering the Cauliflower Tacos as a plant-based option. They come in these delightful little round taco shells, topped with roasted cauliflower and grilled pineapple salsa. 

Garden Street Bowl

Who knew that a bowling alley could have such delicious eats? The Crotux Kitchen and Taphouse has a huge menu with everything from snacks to entrees. You can dine at a table or even right at your own bowling lane. I opted for something a little more light as I bowled: an order of roasted chili hummus and fries with truffle ketchup. I also ordered a ginger kombucha, which was so refreshing.

Mike’s Clam Shack

Now, what is a vegan like myself doing at Mike’s Clam Shack? Located in Wells, there’s even something for the vegetarians in the crowd from their gigantic menu. I verified with the kitchen that their veggie burger is vegan. While many people flock to Mike’s Clam Shack for the seafood, I highly recommend trying the veggie burger as it’s super tasty.

Norma’s Restaurant

Norma’s Restaurant in York might be a bit of a greasy spoon, but it’s a favorite among the locals for breakfast. There weren’t too many vegan choices on the menu, but I ordered some fried potatoes and some toast with jam. 

Cafes & Coffee

I don’t know about you, but I love staying caffeinated on my travels. And in daily life. With a coffee in my hand, I’m going to tell you about the best coffee shops in southern that I personally visited. I am sure there are even more than these ones, and I’ll have to check them out on my next trip to the region.

Lil’s Cafe

Lil’s Cafe is a coffee shop and bakery in Kittery, . While they don’t have any vegan baked goods, they do have lots of fresh bread if you’re hungry. I stuck to a simple Americano at Lil’s, and it was really delicious. I am certain that they have plant-based milks for your lattes and cappuccinos, too. If you feel like you’re in the mood for shopping, Lil’s Cafe has a record shop attached to it. Browse the collection of LPs at Lil’s Vinyl Vault. 

Dock Square Coffee House

Dock Square Coffee House is a cute cafe in the heart of Kennebunkport’s tourist shopping area. I stopped by for a cup of coffee and sat by the front window to watch the people walking by. Locals and tourists alike stopped by for a quick pick me up, even with their dogs in tow. I really enjoyed the peaceful atmosphere of this cafe, and the coffee tasted really good, too.

Christian’s Cafe and Eatery

Christian’s Cafe and Eatery is right on the main downtown street in Kennebunk. I stopped by for a cappuccino made with soy milk, as well as a quick bite to eat. While there weren’t any vegan items on the menu, the staff were quick to offer to help. They made a toasted bagel with vegetable toppings, like lettuce, cucumber, and onion (instead of the cream cheese). It was a really tasty snack, and the cappuccino really hit the spot, too.

Where to Stay in Southern

I highly recommend staying in Ogunquit during your trip to southern . It’s centrally located right in the middle of this collection of villages. Ogunquit translates to “beautiful place by the sea” and I can’t imagine a better place to spend your holiday. The Dunes on the Waterfront is a stunning resort where you’ll have an extremely memorable vacation.

Cottage Living

At the Dunes on the Waterfront, you’ll stay in your own little cottage. They face the water and the spectacular sand dunes off in the distance. Each cottage comes with a large bed, a flatscreen TV with cable, complimentary Wi-Fi, a wood burning fireplace with logs, and a full kitchen. You could prepare your own meals here if you wish. I also loved the separate screened in front porch where you could enjoy a cup of coffee in the morning as you watched the sun come up.

Exploring the Dunes

There is a river crossing at Dunes at the Waterfront. Depending on the tides, you can either take a rowboat across to the other side or you can walk. The staff members will provide you with a tide chart detailing when it’s possible to walk or take a boat. There are five row boats at the boat dock, and you can sign up to rent them at the front desk.

Watching the Sunrise

If you’re feeling up to it, one of the best things to do in southern is watching the sunrise. The absolutely perfect place to watch the sun come up is right from the comfort of your own cottage. I woke up bright and early at 5:00am to watch the sunrise on two occasions. There was too much cloud cover on the first day (it still looked pretty!). However, there were ideal conditions on the second day. The sky became an intensely vibrant shade of orange as the day began, and it looked so beautiful reflecting off the water. 

I can’t imagine that there’s a better place to stay than The Dunes on the Waterfront. It truly felt like a relaxing vacation staying at my own cottage right on the water. With modern amenities, my own kitchen, and even a cozy fireplace, it was absolutely wonderful. Be sure to book your stay at The Dunes or you can check out more reviews written by fellow travelers.

Southern Map

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[technato]

China Promises the Moon

The next step may be the first-ever soft landing on the lunar far side

Illustration: MCKIBILLO

Illustration: MCKIBILLO

Last July, when a Chinese Long March 5 rocket lifted off from the country’s newest spaceport, the Wenchang Space Launch Center on the island of Hainan, the vehicle’s official mission was to place an experimental communications satellite into orbit. The launch, though, had a secondary purpose: It was to be a final test before the Long March 5, China’s newest and largest rocket, was entrusted with the country’s most ambitious science mission ever.

It failed the test.

The launch initially appeared to go well and was hailed on Chinese television⁠—which, in a rare move, broadcast the event live—as another success for the country’s increasingly ambitious space program. But keen-⁠eyed observers noticed that the trajectory of the rocket, as seen on displays visible during the broadcast, didn’t match the predicted path. Soon, official Chinese media acknowledged that the rocket would fail to reach orbit—and abruptly ended the broadcast.

Had the mission been a success, the next launch for the Long March 5 rocket, planned for late 2017, would have carried the Chang’e-5 spacecraft. That mission would do something not attempted in more than four decades: land on the moon, collect samples, and return them to Earth. Those plans are now on hold and will perhaps remain so until 2019. But China still promises to make significant advances in its long-term lunar ambitions in 2018 by making the first-ever landing on the moon’s far side.

Chang’e-5 is the latest in an incremental series of lunar missions flown by China over the past decade, each building on the achievements of the previous ones. (“Chang’e” is the name of the Chinese goddess of the moon.)

“The Chang’e program includes three steps,” said Xiao Long, a lunar scientist at the China University of Geosciences, during a meeting of the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group in Maryland in October. “One is orbiting, the second is landing, and the third one is sample return.”

Chang’e-1, launched in October 2007, was China’s first lunar-orbiter mission. “It was very successful,” said Xiao, providing a variety of scientific data and allowing for the construction of a global map of the moon to support future lander missions.

Chang’e-2, built as a backup to Chang’e-1, lifted off three years later. With updated scientific instruments, it collected more data about the moon, then used its thrusters to leave lunar orbit, flying by the near-Earth asteroid Toutatis in 2012.

In December 2013, China moved on to the second planned step with the landing of Chang’e-3. That made China the third country after the United States and the former Soviet Union to successfully soft-land a spacecraft on the moon. The lander carried a suite of instruments as well as a small rover, called Yutu, or “Jade Rabbit.”

A little more than a month after landing, Yutu suffered a malfunction that immobilized it, although it was still able to make observations in place. China has published only a limited analysis of the data collected by Chang’e-3, but Xiao said that one of the lander’s instruments, a ground-penetrating radar, was particularly useful in probing the lunar subsurface.

With the first two steps accomplished, China is eager to move on to step 3: sample return. Prior to the July launch failure, China’s space agency, the China National Space Administration (CNSA), planned to go directly to Chang’e-5, rather than launch Chang’e-4, the backup lander mission. Chang’e-5 would first go into orbit around the moon before a lander module separated and touched down in Oceanus Procellarum, the large dark area on the western half of the moon’s near side.

In addition to various scientific instruments, the lander has a robotic arm, intended to grab up to 2 kilograms of lunar rock and soil samples. Those samples will be placed inside a capsule that is then launched into orbit around the moon. That capsule will dock with the orbiter part of the spacecraft, which will then boost it out of lunar orbit and back to Earth, landing in Inner Mongolia. If successful, Chang’e-5 would return the first samples from the moon since the Soviet Union’s Luna 24 mission in 1976.

If that July mission had met its goals, another Long March 5 rocket might have launched Chang’e-5 as soon as November, with samples returning to Earth two weeks later. Now, it’s not clear when the sample-return mission will go.

Tian Yulong, secretary general of CNSA, discussed the status of the mission at the recent International Astronautical Congress, a major annual space conference held last year in September in Adelaide, Australia. He said that the cause of the Long March 5 failure was still unknown. And he acknowledged that Chang’e-5 would be delayed, perhaps for an extended period. “By the end of [2017] we will have some detailed information” about the revised schedule, he said.

Photos, Top: Wang Jianmin/Xinhua/Alamy; Bottom: Zhang Wenjun/Xinhua/Getty Images

Moon Shot: China’s Long March 5 rocket [bottom photo] will be used for a lunar sample-return mission, expanding on what was accomplished by the lander China put on the moon in 2013 [top].

Many experts following China’s space program predict that Chang’e-5 will be delayed until 2019. That’s because it’ll take time for the investigation to determine the cause of the failure and then for the work needed to remedy the problem. And they expect China to perform at least one launch of the vehicle, if not more, before officials feel confident enough about it for a mission as significant as Chang’e-5. “After one or two successful launches, then Chang’e-5 will go. That’s my guess,” said Xiao.

The extended delay in Chang’e-5, though, doesn’t mean China’s lunar exploration program will grind to a halt this year. Chang’e-4, the backup to Chang’e-3, may still launch in 2018 because it can use a different rocket, one not affected by the Long March 5 accident.

Chang’e-4 would be similar to the 2013 Chang’e-3 mission—with one important exception: The spacecraft would be the first by any country to attempt a landing on the far side of the moon. Because the landing site is out of view from Earth—and thus out of radio contact with it—Chang’e-4 will need a dedicated communications relay satellite in lunar orbit. With it, the lander may be able to shed light on the intriguing nature of the far side, which lacks extensive maria. These “seas,” vast volcanic plains of dark basaltic rock, are prominent features of the near side.

At the International Astronautical Congress, CNSA’s Tian didn’t indicate when Chang’e-4 would launch, saying only that its schedule would be adjusted along with that of Chang’e-5. But Xiao believes the communications relay satellite needed for the far-side mission will launch in mid-2018, followed by the Chang’e-4 lander—again carrying a small rover—late in the year.

China’s plans for lunar exploration don’t end with Chang’e-5, no matter when it might launch. Just as China developed backup orbiters and landers, there is a backup sample-return mission, Chang’e-6, that could fly later.

Chang’e-6, Xiao said, might go to the lunar poles, an area of interest both to scientists and to those planning future human missions to the moon. Craters near the poles—including those in the giant South Pole–Aitken basin on the far side—have regions that remain perpetually in shadow because of the moon’s very small axial tilt. Those spots are cold enough to preserve water ice indefinitely, and some past missions have detected strong evidence of ice in those craters. Future human missions could use that water for life support as well as for fuel, by breaking it down into hydrogen and oxygen.

Even if Chang’e-6 lands elsewhere—or does not launch at all—China plans to study the lunar poles in detail in the 2020s. A series of three missions, including landers and sample-return spacecraft, will study the moon’s polar regions, Xiao said.

China is not alone in its interest in the poles of the moon. Russia has a series of four missions under development for launch from 2019 through 2024, including lander and sample-return missions to the lunar poles. NASA is also working on a lunar rover called Resource Prospector, designed to confirm that water ice exists in those shadowed craters and to study how difficult it is to extract. Current plans call for that mission to launch in the early 2020s.

China’s longer-term plans include human missions to the moon but are without much in the way of details. “The goal is to establish a research station,” Xiao said, sometime between 2025 and 2050.

China’s overall lunar exploration plan has earned the endorsement of one major American lunar scientist. “Their program is extremely robust,” said James Head of Brown University, who has been involved in lunar missions since the Apollo program.

Head visited China recently and came away impressed with the country’s commitment to lunar exploration. “There’s a lot of excitement about this program,” he said. “There’s historically not been a major lunar and planetary science community in China, but in the last decade or so it’s been growing.”

China’s interest in and capabilities for lunar exploration create opportunities for international cooperation. And the Chinese government has indeed shown itself open for that: Four of the instruments on the Chang’e-4 lander come from other countries: one each from Germany, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, and Sweden.

But cooperation between the United States and China in space is complicated by U.S. law. For the past several years, Congress has included provisions in the bills funding NASA that prohibit the space agency from cooperating with China without explicit prior approval from Congress. That restriction is based on fears by some in Congress about the theft of intellectual property or other security risks if NASA were to engage with China.

There are other hurdles as well. Head had invited Yu Guobin, vice director of the Lunar and Space Exploration Engineering Center of China, to speak at a conference in the United States last year. Yu accepted, but the U.S. embassy rejected his visa application shortly before he was to fly to the United States. Head said Yu was never given the reason his visa application was denied, and other Chinese scientists attending the conference had no such problems. (The U.S. embassy declined to comment to IEEE Spectrum about why it rejected Yu’s visa application.)

Head said the benefits of cooperation with China in lunar exploration outweigh any perceived security risks. “I worked with the Soviet Union and Russia for 45 years, and I’m here to tell you that you have to be very careful with technological transfer and other national security issues,” he said. “Nonetheless, there’s much to be gained from cooperation and collaboration.”

He’s hopeful that China and the United States will eventually be able to work more closely to explore the moon, both with robots and with people. “We would be derelict in our duty for the future if we did not emphasize that this is an international endeavor,” Head said. “It’s in all of our best interests to do what we can to share the scientific knowledge from these missions.”

China Promises the Moon syndicated from http://ift.tt/2Bq2FuP