Friday, September 16, 2022

Day 39 - A Spaceport in the Amazon?

Today, we had a short ride from Cayenne, the capital of French Guiana, to Kourou where the European Space Agency spaceport is. 

The town is small and well maintained with a lot of engineering firms around the spaceport and a good economy.  We went to the spaceport museum only to find out that we needed to be cleared by security in Paris 48-hours prior to our arrival so we were unable to go in.  Instead, we visited the surrounding area ... the meteorological center, the final assembly buildings, the launch pads.

This whole country feels very French and very much like a beach resort area ... the weather (hot and muggy), the palm trees, the wind, the ocean, the beaches, the hotels, and the restaurants by the beach. It just makes you feel like you should be by a pool, drinking something colorful with a small umbrella in it ... so, that is what we did in the afternoon at our hotel.

Went out for dinner by the beach and realized that all the restaurant owners and staff spoke Spanish ... it was like a homecoming ... we are able to communicate again ... they were from Peru, Ecuador, Dominican Republic, Colombia, and even Brasil ... and then I realized that my Portuguese had improved a lot from all the time we spent in the Amazon.  We sat down by the ocean to watch kite surfers do their thing. 

After dinner, we went to a coffee shop owned by somebody from Shanghai to have chocolate filled beignets and cappuccinos.  Seems like there are people from all over the world living here.

The food in this country is several notches above anything we have had in a long time. Very very nice.

Tomorrow, we head to the border with Suriname ... now we need to learn some Dutch!

Arriving at the European Space Center in French Guiana

A quick trip to the moon

A big model of an Ariane rocket and one of our Honda 500s

A real life spent rocket fuel section of an Ariana rocket

A typical street in Kourou

Having a fish dinner at the beach watching some kite surfers do tricks

Our Satellite tracker so far! 

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