(France) My dream is to go to the Universe.

[14/02/14~17 (D+902) France/(to Toulouse)]My dream is to go to the Universe.

My dream is to go to the universe. I want to see other life in other planet. Is this dream one I really want? I want to check my motivation of the trip.

I’ve kept in touch with Sam whom I met in Tanzania. He said his mother has B&B in a small village of France that she could invite me.

I have stayed for two nights in a small village. She cooked mussel at the last night and it was fantastic taste! It was really good rest at her place.

Here her B&B is – http://www.domainethomson.com/

She has asked for a few times that she could give me a ride for some kilometers to save my time, because I have to ride long way today. She is so kind, but I said I want to cycle myself.

I like to pass a small village in France, because it is so peaceful and quiet.

Sam’s mom makes a canned food and sells. I though she has a factory. But actually she buys cans which is opened and she puts the food on the can. Then she goes to the shop where they can close a lid with a machine.

I try to eat the food she gave me, and then horses come and look at me like a hungry dog.

There are a village people who are hunting.

It rains at the morning. When I looked at the map before starting, it looked very hilly. But actually it is not much hard job.

Although it is cloudy, I like the quiet road.

It is a family small road of France. But always there is no shoulder.

Here is Canal du Midi

Many people use as the park.

Canal du midi

After a small village road, I start cycling on a canal. Today is really happy day although there is no such a special thing. Just I like the way people treat me. They love to greet at me “Bonjour” with smiling. Who says French is arrogant and rude? Haha. They are like a small village of American that they greet with a big smile at the most of time.
I saw one lady who doesn’t have face. When she saw me, I gave her a big smile at first, and then she gave me back bigger smile! Oh! I love greeting with people smiling! This is the one of part I like while cycling.

Congratulation of 24,000 km.(15,000 mi) I try to take picture of me myself while putting a camera on some wall, but it is not easy. The elder couple passing stops and tells me they can take picture of me. So this picture is taken by them. I arrive in a host house at the late night, because it is quite long way.

I want to make 1,000 km (625 mi) in France. If I cycle just along the east sea, then I can make only 700 km (437 mi). So, I decide to go around middle of France a little bit to Toulouse. I heard that there is ESA (European Space Agency) in Toulouse. But I didn’t have detail info. My host says I can visit the space museum which is Cita de l’espace.
The entrance fee is 20.5 Euros. At the beginning on the museum, I feel really embarrassed. At the reception I left my new sunglass which I bought in Spain for 16 Euros.
Usually I’ve done this one dozens of time over two years, because once I went to inside of a shop, I took it off at somewhere and forgot. But all the time when I went back in 5 minutes, there my sunglass was.
But this time it is gone so quickly. How come… so poor many Latin American and African never took my sunglass I forgot. But much rich French took it……..
I can buy new one. The money doesn’t matter. Just I am disappointed at people.
The museum is separated by three parts as the park, exhibition and cinema. It is really big that I must come in the early morning, but I arrived around the noon.

Soyuz is a series of spacecraft initially designed for the Soviet space in the 1960s, and still in service today. The Soyuz spacecraft is launched by the Soyuz rocket, the most frequently used and most reliable launch vehicle in the world to date. The Soyuz craft is designed to come down on land, usually somewhere in the deserts of Kazakhstan in central Asia. This is in contrast to early US manned missions which “splashed down” in the ocean.

The U.S also had the Space Shuttle, but they stopped it since 2011. The U.S has to pay 71 million to Russia to have a seat on Soyuz until 2017. But actually it is much cheaper(?) that the average cost per flight of Space Shuttle was about US$1.5 billion

Ariane 5 is, as a part of Ariane rocket family, an expendable launch system used to deliver payloads into geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) or low Earth orbit (LEO)
Ariane 5’s first test flight on 4 June 1996 failed, with the rocket self-destructing 37 seconds after launch because of a malfunction in the control software. A subsequent test flight (on 21 October 1998) proved successful and the first commercial launch occurred on 10 December 1999 with the launch of the XMM-Newton X-ray observatory satellite.

Its trademark exhibition is a full-size mock-up of the Ariane 5 launch vehicle.

It is a full-size mock-up of the ESA XMM-Newton x-ray telescope (launched in 1999, still operational)

Parts of the Rocket

Mir was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, owned by Russia. It had a greater mass than that of any previous spacecraft. It held the record for the largest artificial satellite orbiting the Earth until that record was surpassed by the International Space Station after Mir’s deorbit on 21 March 2001

Here the history of the space station on the earth.
In 1971, Salyut by Russia (Weight 8 tons)
In 1973, Skylab by the U.S (Wight 18 tons)
In 1986, Mir by Russia (Weight 77 tons)

Now there are only two space stations.
In 1998, The International Space Station (ISS) by 16 countries. (Weight 417 tons)
(Brazil, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States)
In 2011, Tiangong-1 by China (Weight 8 tons)

Since 2011, only Russian spacecraft can send people to the space station in the world. BUT Shenzhou, Chinese spacecraft, docked with Tiangong-1 and there was three-person crew (one female).

Soyuz docking.
To remain in orbit at this altitude requires an orbital speed of 7.8 km/s that docking is really difficult. But China succeeds recently! Now there is Russia vs China

It is really small!!! I wish I can sit over there.
Valeri, a Russian former cosmonaut, is the holder of the record for the longest single spaceflight in human history, staying aboard the Mir space station for more than 14 months (437 days) during one trip. His combined space experience is more than 22 months.

Yuri Gagarin was the first human to journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961. Gagarin became an international celebrity, and was awarded many medals and titles. Gagarin later became deputy training director of the Cosmonaut Training Centre outside Moscow, which was later named after him. Gagarin died in 1968 when the MiG-15 training jet he was piloting crashed.

It is the way Soyuz is coming to the land of the Earth.

It’s shown above with another major outdoor exhibition, a full-size, walk-through mock-up of Russia’s late, great Mir space station. I knew that Mir was big, but I was surprised at just how big it really was. It’s set up with walkways around and through its several modules so you can really get an idea of what it was like inside

It is the toilet of the space station. It is much better than African one I used to go.

It is the bathroom. I think I can survive so easily. Haha. This is much better than one I used to in third countries.

I didn’t rotate the picture. Usually astronaut slept vertically. It is said that these days because of lack of gravity in space, the astronauts can choose to sleep either horizontally or vertically. Many of them sleep in their seats or in special sleeping bags that are attached to the walls.

As of September 26, 2013, people from 35 countries have traveled in space. 532 people have reached Earth orbit.
(332 people from the U.S, 116 Russian, 10 Chinese, 10 Germans, 9 Canadian, 9 French, 9 Japaneses, 6 Italians etc.. )

The youngest person to fly in space is Gherman Titov, who was 25 years old when he flew Vostok 2. (Titov was also the first person to suffer space sickness). The oldest person who has flown in space is John Glenn, who was 77 when he flew on STS-95.

As of 2006, the most spaceflights by an individual astronaut is seven, a record held by both Jerry L. Ross and Franklin Chang-Diaz. The farthest distance from Earth an astronaut has traveled was 401,056 km (249,205 mi), when Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, and Fred Haise went around the Moon during the Apollo 13 emergency.

The first person to fly on an entirely privately funded mission was Mike Melvill, piloting SpaceShipOne flight 15P on a suborbital journey, although he was a test pilot employed by Scaled Composites and not an actual paying space tourist. Seven others have paid to fly into space.

Inside of Mir space station.

Astronauts are susceptible to a variety of health risks including decompression sickness, barotrauma, immunodeficiencies, loss of bone and muscle, loss of eyesight, orthostatic intolerance, sleep disturbances, and radiation injury. On December 31, 2012, a NASA-supported study reported that manned spaceflight may harm the brain and accelerate the onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

Arian 5 and Mir space station.
Animals in space originally only served to test the survivability of spaceflight, before manned space missions were attempted. Later, animals were also flown to investigate various biological processes and the effects microgravity and space flight might have on them.
Monkeys Able and Baker became the first monkeys to survive spaceflight after their 1959 flight.

It is Terr Dome, but closed.
On July 2, 1959, a launch of a Soviet R2 rocket, which reached 212 kilometers (132 mi), carried two space dogs and Marfusa, the first rabbit to go into space.
During the 1950s and 1960s the Soviet Union launched missions with passenger slots for at least 57 dogs. The number of dogs in space is smaller, as some dogs flew more than once. Most survived

Polar observer

There are large building houses for a planetarium and an IMAX theater. An IMAX theater shows 5 times the same movie per day and a planetarium shows three different movies over 6 times.
I don’t have much time that I decide to watch only an IMAX movie which is called “Take a breathtaking journey in the deep universe”. It is just fantastic movie ever that I am so moved and touched by its beauty. On the movie one of scene I love so much is about ESO(European Southern Observatory in Chile).
Actually I tried to contact to ESO, but I’ve never got an answer from them while cycling in Latin America. While cycling, I’ve tried many things such as trying to contact to Korea Antarctic Research in Antarctica, but most of time I’ve never got an answer from them. hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
The Museum closes around 6 pm that I hurry to exhibition. The above picture is about Viking engine of Arian Rocket.

The exhibition is actually more for students that many things show at the interesting way. When button is clicked, the light is on where it was built. Every part is built in different countries.

Arians

Cochlea is a spiral-shaped cavity in the bony labyrinth, in humans making 2.5 turns around its axis, the modiolus.
Astronaut could have the problem with zero gravity.

So, they must be used to be sick about it. It is one of training ways. She input times and speed on computer. I ask her the fastest one. Haha.
She says I must close my eyes. At the middle of turning, she asks me leaning head a little bit. As trying, suddenly I am too sick of balance.
If I opened my eyes, I am sure it would be the worst. I think I should be used to take small boat to overcome this one.

It is the physics experiments about the space vacuum.

The level 2 is about the weather. It is funny to see how weather caster works. I though they point on the empty screen. But it is not! I wish I have some friend to play this one together.

It is comparing about a gravity between the moon and the earth.

I heard that a few years ago ESA looked for the astronaut, and thousands of people applied. My host said he also tried. He said flying time and diploma are necessary. I hope they accept also world cycling time. hahahaha
I wish I have come earlier to the museum to see more movies and exhibitions. Anyway to visit the space museum is really good chance to check my dream.
I am sure the universe is SO HUGE ever that there are too many planets where the other life lives. I understand I can never travel the Universe for now. But I will keep this dream to make real one day. I will try to find the way.