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Heading south on CA-138 between Palmdale and San Bernardino, interesting rocks along the road
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If you ever have trouble remembering all those eras, visit the entrance to the Western Museum of Paleontology and Archeology
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We like their way of displaying fossils - the bones they have against an outline of the whole beast
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There were a couple of animatronic critters, including this nasty-looking scorpion
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The east end of Diamond Valley Lake just after sunset. The museum's stuff came from digs as the lake was built
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We almost didn't notice this osprey perched in front of us . .
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Atop Palomar Mountain, the dome of the 200 inch Hale telescope minimizes Judy
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A cutaway model of the telescope inside the dome
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The museum displays several of the better images made by the Hale telescope
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Astronomers think most galaxies are spirals like this, but we don't always see them broadside
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The path from the parking lot up to the big dome is an easy walk, even for us
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George Hale was the founder of the Palomar Observatory, but died before the big scope was finished in 1949
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The 20" model shows the cellular structure of the Pyrex mirror that made it posible to cast such a huge piece of glass.
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A diagram of the telesope, explaining what does what
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The bottom end of the telesope. The mirror is inside that green ring near the top of the image
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An experimental infrared Interferometer combines the output from 3 smaller scopes (in those buildings on rails) to produce very high resolution images
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Now we're at March Air Museum. This North American SNJ-4 "Texan" was used as a Navy trainer in WW-II
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Fairchild PT-19B Cornell - a trainer built in 1938
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B-47 cockpit mockup used in the 1955 Jimmy Stewart movie "Strategic Air Command"
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Overview of some of the many indoor displays
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The B-13A Vultee Valiant was a WW-II Army Air Corps trainer.
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Same model - this Valiant flew in the 1970 movie "Tora Tora Tora" in this disguise as a Japanese Navy dive bomber
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This McDonnell-Douglas F-4E Phantom II dates to 1969
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A Boeing KC-97 StratoTanker, a refueler dating to the 1960's
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A Polish-built Russian Anushka transport. Still being built and used in China.
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March has an impressive collection of Russian MIG aircraft
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The FO-141 Gnat was built in Britian to see how small a jet could be and still function. Tip of the nose is just 3ft off the ground.
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This Grumman HU-16E Albatross is being repainted
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Looks like this one needs a lot of TLC
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Bell AH-1F Cobra of Vietnam War fame (or notoriety)
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That's a B-29 Superfortress long range bomber from WW-II.
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This SR-71 Blackbird was used in one scene of the Clint Eastwood movie "Space Cowboys"
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The little fellow is a Cessna T-37 "Tweet" - a popular jet trainer used from 1957 to July 2009
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The B-52 bombers were affectionately nicknamed BUFFs - for "Big Ugly Fat Fellows" (we suspect that's the PG version of what BUFF means)
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Piasecki H-21B Workhorse - the "Flying Banana" - was the first heavy-lift helicopter
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While we were there, some refueling tankers were doing touch-and-go landings
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Getting pictures was a bit of a challenge
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The museum's entrance courtyard, with their Minuteman II ICBM behind the wall
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Now we're in Pasadena at the JPL - where all the space robots are created and operated
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There were about 50 folks on our tour, divided into two manageable groups
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Half-size model of the Cassini???Huygens spacecraft, currently surveying Saturn. It was launched in 1997
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A Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter - note the big camera lens on the side
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A 1/4 scale model of the WFPT2 - main camera of the Hubble Telescope from 1994 to mid-2009. Took a lot of really neat pictures
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About 3 ft long. The real one didn't have a plexiglass skin
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Launched in 1989, JPL's Galileo spent 8 years exploring Jupiter and its moons. Full-scale replica.
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State of the art in 1989 - good old 1/4 inch reel-to-reel technology. Today, any cell phone has more memory.
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The fuzzy block is Aerogel, the least dense solid ever made, and a very effective thermal insulator. It's 99.8% air. They call it "frozen smoke".
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JPL is adjacent to the Angeles National Forest, thus hosting many local mule deer
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Inside a clean room, they're assembling the Mars Science Laboratory, scheduled for launch in 2011
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On the slanted stand is the plutonium-based power supply. The rover itself is behind those four clean-suited workers
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They build two of each rover - one to launch, the other as a backup. The rover wheels will mount on those big black things
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JPL Mission Control - the Space Flight Operations Facility, communications hub for all of NASA's unmanned space explorers
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Our JPL tour guide was very knowledgeable, and we could actually hear him most of the time
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The entrance to the Cheese Factory - where we could take a tour!
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Big deal tour - up those steps, look through the window. The whole factory was in about 9 big trailers. But the cheese was wonderful!
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Ho Ho Ho - some of the holiday display at Tom's Farms in Corona, CA
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They claimed a million lights. We didn't count.
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Most of the lights seemed to be in various sculptures in a big field
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To see them, you had to ride their cute little train. We didn't
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Finally, we'd never heard of this beer before - but we like their slogan!