Our time in Texas
The first place we went to on our trip around the western United States was an island in Texas called Galveston. We lived there for about one month and a few days in December. On our first week, we tried to go to the Gulf of Mexico, but the water was freezing. Most of our time in Texas was spent in our home in Galveston and in Houston because of a pass that let you visit five places in Houston. These places were the Houston Space Center, the Museum of Natural Science, the Houston Zoo (or the Museum of Fine Arts, which we didn't do as you could only pick one), the Downtown Aquarium (which we didn't do as we didn't have time), and the Kemah Boardwalk (or Children's Museum of Houston).
I think the best thing in the "CityPASS" was the Houston Space Center. There was plenty of things there including a fallen meteorite on display and moon rocks (one of the moon rocks you could touch, as well as the meteorite), the "Independence Plaza" which included a model space shuttle, which would be sent to go to the ISS (International Space Station) and the airplane that would take it to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. There was also a tour of the actual Johnson Space Center including the mission control of the Apollo missions and being able to see a real Saturn V rocket that never got launched.
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| The Saturn V Rocket |
After that, we went to Kemah Boardwalk. Since it's an amusement park, there were plenty of thrill rides and some roller coasters. There were the normal things like a drop tower and a Ferris Wheel, and there were the one of a kind coasters like Iron Eagle. I don't really like thrill rides that much (I like them somewhat, but not obsessively), but some of my other family members do. My brothers rode one ride a lot (called the Hypnospin) and we spent most of our time standing by that area. They also have some shops and a restaurant a little away from most of the rides.
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| The Hypnospin which we spent most of our time at. |
The Houston Zoo was pretty average, but it did have a lot of birds and elephants, which I haven't seen since the zoo in our old home got rid of them. Another thing the zoo had was an area where you could recycle handheld electronics or donate to protect chimpanzees and gorillas. The Houston Museum of Natural Science had a large area about dinosaurs and a cabinet of curiosities (filled with things like animal pelts and things which you could touch). We didn't do the aquarium as we didn't have time, but we heard there were actually very little aquatic related things.


It seems like Galveston was a good choice to begin your trip around the West Coast. Looks like you stayed pretty busy and the NASA excursion was interesting.
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