Space Center Houston

Fun to visit and lots to offer. My kids love it, but they are all still pretty young so there isn’t as much to do with them. Feel fortunate to have such a cool place near by.

Ok, I must admit, I didn’t think a visit to the Space Center would be fun. If you’ve been to any space museum or planetarium, they’re really one in the same. Located about 30 minutes from downtown Houston, the Johnson Space Center is definitely worth a visit if you are in town. This place has many things for a visitor to learn about space and astronaut program.
The main attraction of Space Center Houston is the tram tour. You stop at a few different places during this tram tour, where you get to go inside. One is the historic mission control center (think Apollo 13). Another is Rocket Park, where you can see Saturn V, a humongous rocket. Everything IS bigger in Texas. Seeing the rocket and reading about the missions makes you really think about how monumentally difficult space travel is. Then seeing the inspirational quotes inscribed on the wall inside the hangar about the determination of mankind, getting a flashback of JFK’s famous line about going to the moon not because it is easy, but because it is hard. It seriously humbled me, gave me chills, and renewed my love of this country and its history.
Is it worth it? Yes! Marvel about the history of manned space flight. See a huge rocket and wonder and learn how that thing can fly. Walk into the historic mission control center and be the first to crack «Houston, we have a problem.» Have a blast!

If you’re expecting the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum here, then you might be disappointed. Overall this is a cool place. I personally would skip the tram tour. It only has two stops. Granted they have cool stuff to see, but it was a whole lot of driving and listening to facts while looking at the outside of buildings.

We loved this place and recommend it highly! I wish we had had more time. Plan to get there early and stay until it closes– next time, that’s what we’ll do. Fascinating insight into the space program. It was an exciting day learning about space and space exploration.

Exhibits broken. Thought there would be more to do for the expensive price of admission. Very disappointed. The only reason I gave two stars was bc of tram tour.

I’ve been to NASA about 3 times now and it’s progressively getting worse. For the $ 25 ticket to get in I really expected more. Our Out-​Of-​Town (Country) visitor was impressed with the rockets, but the stuff inside was… Meh… We gladly stood for the camera and had our picture taken in front of the screen; however, later find out that it’s $ 30 dollars!!! Wow. that’s pricey even for Disney.
The new shuttle/​ferry display is nice… mostly. The static display is HUGE. .it’s really impressive. You can walk around under the plane, 6 million pounds of 747 is truly impressive. My kids were really disappointed with the shuttle. My daughter has heard stories from me telling how cool it was to see the shuttle come in on the plane while I was in school, but when we walk in, you can clearly tell its just a mockup. The shuttle felt… cheap. At the Pensacola Naval Base Museum you can climb in cockpits. For this you could stick your head in a cockpit mockup. We were really hoping you could take turns sitting up front but no such luck. The closest you can get is a poster board with 2 chairs. It’s more advertisement than anything else.
The stuff inside is showing signs of wear. The upstairs piece where kids can try things out was very disappointing. 3 robotic arms setup for kids to try, none of them worked right, 2 were just flat broken. The shuttle landing sim was… OK… it worked and my kids enjoyed trying it. The rover display was half out of whack too. Rover #1 is broken, Rover #2 isn’t doing well either.
I seem to remember the tour taking you to the active mission control center. This doesn’t happen anymore. Instead you shuffle up 87 stairs for an interesting, but very short talk about the old mission control. Great for historical purposes, but not a highlight. My daughter asked me why they are telling us where JSC employees go for bandaids.
The best part of the tour is the training center and the rocket displays… The Saturn 5 is truly amazing. A person could spend a good amount of time just soaking it all in. The new display by the shuttle exhibit was interesting but people are already defacing it with pennies in the moon display. really sad… really stupid that people would do that.
JSC, fix the stuff you have. Make it more hands on. If you would sell the pictures for $ 15, you’d probably sell a lot more.

Went recently for a seminar. It was really nice. place to have a meeting. Very professional.

Being a space nerd, I loved it! Be prepared though. It can get cold on those trams! The entire facility does need an update. It’s stuck in the 80s and you can tell. The tour of the mock facility and Saturn V were very interesting. The mission control tour was pretty underwhelming, so if you are limited on time, just take the red tour to the mock training facility.
Also don’t miss the stargazer and central space theater movies. They’re actually well produced.
All in all, I think the hefty $ 25 admission is a bit much for the quality of the attractions, but if you do Houston City Pass, it’s worth it. The center is opening their Independence Shuttle exhibit which will be a great addition to the collection. If you want to see everything, make sure you get there when the doors open because the lines can get long and the tours/​movies take 45 – 60 min each.

We were in Houston for medical reasons and had a half day free so we went out to the Johnson Space Center. The museum has a very good collection of historic spacecraft that actually flew in space as well as a number of the simulators that astronauts train on and that were used to troubleshoot problems when the real craft were in space.
The tram tour is ok as they take you to the historic mission control, training facility, and the rocket park. It is cool to see all the training craft and awe inspiring to stand beside a Saturn rocket that is laid on its side. You have no idea how big it is until you are standing under the massive engines. By contrast, the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft are so small you can’t imagine someone voluntarily cramming into one and spending hours, much less days orbiting the Earth in one of them. For me, one of the highlights of the museum is the Spacelab simulator that has been opened up so you can walk through it.
The audio guide is so-​so. There are very few locations with the audio components and you can learn mostly the same stuff by reading the signs and watching the videos. The movie before entering the Spacecraft exhibit is also mediocre, consisting of short clips of historic footage accompanied by a blah soundtrack. You can easily skip the movie by entering through the side. Ask a museum worker how to bypass the film.

Amazing! We thought we would have enough time to do everything but the times online and via phone said an hour later than what was at the actual door. Felt like we were rushed and there was so much more to see. Next time we will make more time to see everything. I have been hear before maybe about 10 years ago when my daughter was a baby. My husband and I enjoyed it. Yet it’s so much better when your children are older and you see the amazement in their eyes. The tours were nice. Tram ride was fun. Gift shop was nice and had a lot of neat things. I can’t put a full review because we didn’t get to see everything.
1 star for facilities
1 star for price (military discounted tickets from itt)
1 star for service
1 star for clean bathrooms
1 star for overall experience.
Can’t wait to go again!

I wasn’t expecting there to be very much to do here, so you can imagine my surprise when my group wound up spending 4 hours here. Walking out my first thoughts were: «…did I just get Interstellar’d? What year is it? Where’s Amelia?!» I wouldn’t say I’m particularly inclined toward space and flight, so I expected to veer more towards the side of bored. But I was pretty pleased with my time here. Especially since a large chunk of it was seated.
From the get-​go, my immediate goal was hopping on the tram tour because what beats being seated and informed? Misunderstood this entirely as the tram actually just transports you to government buildings and a separate museum site a road down. Also I went on a particularly crap day for weather in Houston so it was overcast and chilly the entire afternoon. Beyond these initial hangups, I was pleasantly surprised by this part of the visit because actually seeing Mission Control was super cool. The Rocket Park on the way back was solidly interesting as well. A stroll past the Apollo wall tribute was a welcome snippet of history and seeing Saturn V in person was great too.
Trekking back to the main museum after about an hour and a half or so, there were a solid amount of attractions to fill more time. Visited the Theater (because again, more sitting!) and watched a 15 minute long video on space/​aeronautic history that felt maybe 8 years too dated. Trolled around everywhere else and was pretty okay with the space facts thrown at me that I almost immediately forgot. There’s also an Angry Birds themed section for kids that admittedly was still fun as a 22 year-​old.
Overall was pretty content with this visit. Not really a life-​changing museum experience or anything but def would recommend to out-​of-​towners. And swing by the gift shop for kitschy nerd stuff.

Make sure you participate in their special tours to get the real experience! It’s quite the wait, but it’s definitely an experience I will never forget. The staff here at Space Center Houston are really knowledgeable in their work. It’s better to come here on the weekdays, versus the weekends because of the obvious avoidance of large crowds and also, it’s when staff members are present in the mission control center; this is where all the fun happens! Waits for the shuttle cart take about 20 – 30 minutes.

I’ve visited a few times when I was younger and have few fond memories of this place, but my boyfriend wanted to go and I was curious to see if anything has changed and wanted to take a trip down memory lane.
It was nothing like I remembered. For some reason, my memories told me it was more futuristic and less mcdonalds play pen, but when the doors opened, I was met with a huge surprise. Why does everything look so fake? (Houston! We have a problem!)
The only positive I took from this was the tram tour around the facility, it was pretty informative, but I wouldn’t pay $ 25 for it.
Now that my memory is fully functioning. I’m 100% sure I won’t be coming back. It really wasn’t that great and I can stay in Houston and find more interesting museums and exhibit for cheaper and closer proximity.

Having now been to both the Port Canaveral Space Center and the Houston location, I have to say I wasn’t super impressed with the Houston one. There is simply not as impressive a lineup of real rockets and shuttles, it’s smaller, they don’t have the same big IMAX movie experience, etc.
My 3 year old niece still had a great time, and the kids area was very engaging for her, but as an adult there just isn’t quite as much to do and see as in Florida. There’s a new area still under construction so maybe once that’s operational there will be a bit more to engage with?
There’s a pretty big food court with wallet-​gouging prices inside, but at least the Starbucks inside is still normally priced! The Space Center Houston definitely a place to go if you’re looking for something to do with the kiddos, but if it’s just adults, I’m sure there are other ways to spend your time and money while on Houston.

After reading a review on the Level 9 tour (It’s on an obscure link on the NASA Houston Space Center website) I decided to give it a go. For $ 90 there was not much to lose. The tour started at 10:45am and I got there around 10:25am to be on the safe side. I read the email carefully and went past the security (They just check bags and ask if you have weapons like pocket knives.) I proceeded to the information desk to get my level 9 VIP pass. The woman at the desk was on the phone for a while with an odd request and the people at the other side of the desk seemed a bit disorganized. After maybe 5 minutes they attended to me and got me my pass. The lady at the desk was very apologetic and it seemed like I caught them at a bad time.
The tour started around 10:50am, there were 8 of us in the group (4 didn’t make it?) We boarded a private van and first went to the Rocket Park were there was a huge rocket inside. Our guide told us stories about the first crews into space here. Next we went to the Neutral buoyancy lab. It is a 40 feet deep swimming pool with a replica of the ISS. Astronauts train here by making mock repairs in a gravity less environment. We got to see one of them on a TV monitor and in the water, which was a great experience. You don’t get to see astronauts dressed up in a space suit everyday.
Next was the vehicle mockup facility. Here we got to see the vehicles used in space up close. We spotted the tram tour above us in a separate closed off balcony. People here were working on projects trying to build equipment and get the robots to work. It was amazing to be so close to the technology used in space. Some of it was still being worked on as we toured the facility.
Lunch was next. We received a free meal ticket that got us whatever we wanted and as much as we liked. There were salads, a hot food station, a sandwich station, burger station, and soup station. The food was pretty decent and kept me filled. There was a small gift shop in the cafeteria where I got some stickers and a shirt. FYI there is a much bigger gift shop at the main Space center. Use this gift shop to get pins, stickers, and other gifts, but if you want some nice shirts, go to the main space center.
The last part of the tour took us to mission control. We got to see the real mission control in action at a booth above. There was big screens with the ISS trajectory and people changing shifts. The astronauts were unfortunately sleeping at this time. One of the ground control directors actually came up and spoke to us which was cool. We also toured the old mission control set up from the Apollo days. It was amazing how everything was metal and they used pneumatic tubes to send mail. I noticed the tram tour above us while we were below sitting at the desks. Last we got to see the new mission control set up for future missions. Employees were testing out everything and making sure everything worked for the next mission. the desks were made out of wood and had recent technology.
The tour ended at about 4pm and we had to return our VIP passes. Souvenir pictures were $ 25. It was definitely worth the $ 90 and I highly recommend that you take it if you have the time and manage to be in Houston when they offer it. After that I toured the Space center and it could not compare. (They were putting in a new exhibit that was ready on October 3^rd so 15% wasn’t ready yet). I would say the main space center is for kids and offers some sort of historical experience for adults. Definitely take the tram tour if you are not doing level 9. The gift shop was amazing and definitely grab a few shirts. The level 9 tour is worth 5 stars and I would say the space center is 3. Tram tour I didn’t take but that could bump it up a little.

Too many negative reviews. Wifey and I had a very positive experience. This place is really two experiences.
1. Space Center Plaza. This is an interior museum with a blend of historic equipment, videos, live «shows», and fee-​based activities. It’s a bit loud, crowded, and busy here, especially in the cafeteria, which serves… yeah you got it: nasty cafeteria food. So, do what you want here and eat elsewhere. Simple. It’ll save you some $$. We found this enjoyable.
2. Tram Tours. There are three tours, all of which overlap (can you say «redundant»? I can!). We opted for for 2 of the 3: Historic Mission Control and International Space Station. Aside from some rude patrons who opted to carry on conversations during the live narrated tour, we found it very informative and had a fun time. For old geezers like me who saw the Apollo missions live, it was a great experience to see the original mission control room!
Secret: Not sure why, but the toll booth operator waved us through and didn’t charge us for parking. Maybe that great start biased us? Nah!

What a great way to spend a day! I’ve always been fascinated by space and loved being able to see the historic Mission Control and all the attractions. There’s so much to do inside for kids as well as adults. So many things to read about and learn and familiarize yourself with in regards to past missions, shuttles, etc.
I was visiting family and had my nieces with me. We decided to take the Tram Tour to Mission Control. Upon entering Mission Control, the speaker at the front was excited to tell us about what we were looking at and what to expect on the tour. Now, when you have kids in the room, sometimes it’s hard for them to sit still. My nieces did a great job, but there was one child who started crying and the speaker stopped what he was doing almost like it was a nuisance and waited for the child to quiet down before continuing. The overall feeling in the room was that he was annoyed with having kids in there, so that’s the only reason for the 4 star instead of 5 because I thought that was kind of rude and made parents feel a bit uncomfortable.
Apart from that, everything else was great. Rocket Park is fascinating especially inside the Saturn V Complex! I also loved being able to see pictures of all the crews from past missions and getting to see all the different space suits that have been worn in space.
My husband was hoping for bigger sized t-​shirts in the gift shop, so hopefully the next time we go back, there will be more variety there. We didn’t leave without buying some astronaut ice cream though! :)
Such a great learning experience and very exciting!

I love this place! If you wanna geek out on all kinds of cool space stuff, come here! I took my friends from the Netherlands here as they are just as nerdy and geeky as I am and we LOVED it! If you’re not interested in space and/​or history, that’s cool, but your loss. Maybe hit the mall or something?
It was cloudy and getting ready to storm and we were given the great advice by one of the employees to get in line for the tram because they stop them if the weather is bad. Sure enough we only got to take one. We missed Mission Control, but we got to see where the astronauts train… so, so cool, and the huge Saturn V rocket. Just. Wow. Just. Yeah.
We had a group of noisy, rowdy kids on the tram with no adult in sight and when they wouldn’t shut up when we stopped at the fallen astronaut’s memorial, I (and about 3 other people) turned around and hushed them. It was really disrespectful and irritating. The memorial is a beautiful grove of trees and is somber and beautiful. It’s not Space Center Houston’s fault that these little brats couldn’t shut up for the WHOLE TOUR but it was irritating as we couldn’t hear what was being said about what we were seeing.
There are also half price tickets all over the place around the Clear Lake area. I found mine at the Walmart in Kemah (hey, my Dutchies love Walmart… who am I to judge?). But I have seen them at Kroger and Subway and Dennys as well. Look for them and use them! Sadly, I’m not sure the $ 24.99 admission fee is worth it but $ 12.50 certainly is!
There is so much to see there, I think we missed some of it because we didn’t plan for enough time; but again, it’s all nerdy, space stuff and history, so if you’re not into that, then you probably wouldn’t enjoy it.
The mock Space Shuttle and aircraft exhibit isn’t open yet, so we were kinda bummed, but you can still see them and how big they are. I remember the shuttle flying over my high school on the jet in the 1980s (yeah yeah, I’m that old) and being in awe of it, and the plane. Seeing it up close (sorta) gave me goosebumps.
So. Get yourself a discount ticket and go see some cool space stuff. It really is worth it. Yes, the food is overpriced, and yes the souvenirs aren’t cheap either, but really is it different anywhere else? Exactly. Now quit yer bellyaching and go enjoy! And please be respectful on the tram when people are trying to listen!

You should REALLY come here early. There are some pretty cool things to check out. I do NOT recommend doing the audio tour, it’s too loud anyways and the audio device is really heavy.
It started getting really hectic after lunch. So many kids and adults running around and screaming. I went on a Saturday, so I guess that’s kinda expected. It just ended up becoming a really stressful experience so I left by 3 pm. I didn’t even get to do the tram ride because I did not want to stand in that line that wrapped around the center of the museum.

Space Center Houston is the public facing facility of NASA in Houston. It’s a great place to visit if you want to learn about NASA, its rich history, and see plenty to space memorabilia up close. They’ve recently added an Angry Birds Space themed children’s area, have a good food court, and still have their tram tours which will bring you up close to some historical NASA landmarks and rockets.
My Overall Rating — 4 Stars (Atmosphere, Service, Facility, Return)
Atmosphere — When you pull into the parking lot, you’ll catch a glimpse of the iconic 747 that used to transport the Space Shuttles when they were in service. It’s a nice photo op, and a great example of what to expect. Inside, it’s a little dark (it’s a space theme of course), but on our summer visit it was busy. It’s big enough so you don’t feel crowded (except in line for the Tram). 1 Star.
Service — Most of the staff is great. Near the entrance is a small stage where a NASA «professor» entertains and educates the crowd about space and physics. The only negative is the staff handling the tram tour. There are two separate tours, but the young staff are extremely inefficient when it comes to loading the Trams. On a hot summer day you hope they would be better, but honesty they really had no clue on how to properly load people which resulted in needless delays. Now, our tour guides were fantastic. They were smart, taught us quite a bit, and answered all our questions. ½ Star.
Facility — There’s quite a bit to do. My recommendation is to do the tram tour as early as you can to avoid a long line. We chose to visit Mission Control, which is only open on weekends. This is the REAL mission control where they monitored all the lunar landings too. The tour will also take you to Rocket Park, and self-​guided tour area that lets you get up close to the real rockets NASA used in their missions. Tons of great photo ops too. Back in the main Space Center, the children’s area has an Angry Birds Space theme. There are plenty of fun games for kids including a two story slide and interactive games and puzzles. There is also a theatre which will take you on a history of NASA and man’s space exploration. Don’t forget to check out REAL moon rocks. Lastly, there’s a large food court that serves decent food! I had a very good chili dog and fries that left me pleasantly surprised since I didn’t have to leave to eat lunch. 2 Stars.
Will I Return? — Maybe. It’s big, but you can cover everything in one day. While I really enjoyed my trip to Space Center Houston, I probably won’t be back unless they add new exhibits or themes. That being said, if you’ve never been to Space Center Houston, it’s a great weekend trip to explore space, NASA, and you’re imagination. ½ Star.
My Unilocal Rating Scale (Sum of all parts):
1 Star — Atmosphere — Is it a cool dive? Perhaps an upscale place? No matter the type, atmosphere plays a big part and I’ll give a star if I like it or thinks it has great charm.
1 Star — Service — You can have a great meal with bad service. But that’s also what can make a five star joint drop to four. It’s important to the dining experience that service is great and on point.
2 Stars — Facility — I’ll award up to two stars for the facility, since this is the main reason we go out. Sometimes the extra star is given for value, but it’s really all about the facility.
1 Star — Will I come back? — If I know for a fact I’ll return, I’ll give this a star. A place has to make an impression for me to return.
Each Category can be given up to 1 star except food (2 stars) because I consider all these categories important to the overall dining experience. I will sum them up to provide my final Unilocal score.

I love Space Center Houston! Every time I come here, I always leave in a great mood. I have come here with family, friends and camp members. There is so much to do and explore here!
My friend and I got two tickets for $ 40 and we began our adventure.
They have tons of exhibits, interactive games, tours, galleries and theater lectures. I like their games the most because they’re simple yet so much fun! The staff members are always helpful and friendly. I also learned a lot from their exhibits and lectures because of all the noob-​friendly information they pack into the center.
Their gift shop has awesome space-​related trinkets to buy! While it definitely is expensive, their merchandise is always fun to look at and sometimes purchase.
The food here is also so well priced for the amount of food you get. The customer service can be poor at times, but also great at times. It just depends on who you get.
I love this place and always come here if I have the opportunity. Swing by for fun!

I really really wanted to love this place.
It has been on my list of top places to visit for a while.
I was expecting much more of a museum feel, but instead found it to be much more like an amusement park. Long lines, long wait times, loads of kids, very noisy, over priced bland food, uninspiring public speakers, and young inexperienced staff.
I did get the audio tour device which I would highly recommend.
Despite the fact that the center is laid out in a totally nonsensical design and that only one of the four main exhibit areas feels thorough and complete. Fortunately this section, the Starship Gallery felt like what I wanted the entire experience to be. Guided audio tour on a per display basis, with in-​depth information from the people who used or created it. Amazing replicas and models, great lighting, and some truly amazing stories and inspiration. However, this section, which takes about an hour to get through was the only one I would really recommend to an adult.
With so many movie theaters, it feels like watching a lot of YouTube videos, for far more money.
The tram tour (I took the blue, to see Mission Control) was about 40 minutes longer than it needed to be, and after an hour wait-​in line was a huge let down. To be fair, seeing the Mission Control room (or one of them) was really neat, and standing next to the Saturn V rocket was an amazing bit of perspective, but the amount of time spent herding people, the noise of the group, the PR friendly «talk» from the NASA guide all felt too generalized and simple. I can read about all of this online, if I come to the MUSEUM I want to see and hear things that are unique and more in-​depth and practical than I can get elsewhere.
I was thinking how difficult it must be to try and populate this place with content, when so much of what makes it great was 40+ years ago.
I would have loved to see an entire section dedicated to the Space Shuttle and all the amazing things it and her crews accomplished, but instead it was relegated to a montage I saw in one of the videos.
There is a section about the ISS and is intended to be a «live look» at what is going on there, but the lady giving the lecture was so bland, and hard to listen to, not to mention that all her information was largely homogenized and generic, lacking any real «live» details, that I felt like I was wasting my time just listening to her.
I wish I could say this is an amazing, wonderful, fun, and unique, one-​of-​a-​kind, must-​see sort of places, but it’s not. It might be fun for kids, and that’s great, but I am the one who pays taxes and funds NASA, so I want to be blown away.
If you do go, hit the Starship Gallery, spend plenty of time there, listen to every audio recording, and enjoy it. It’s really really great.
Everything else? Time permitting…

This is a pretty late review … about a year and some odd months late! Better late than never!!! :)
When I was visiting my family up in Katy last year, my main goal was to get them to drive me to The Space Center. If you know me, you know I LOOOOOVE anything that has to do with space! I said it folks … I am a space junkie and proud of it! :D However, this is not the place for you if you are not into space, aeronautical stuff. you will be bored to death. I can literally spend the entire day there.
I’ve been there before countless times when I was a kid … but I never really appreciated it as much as I do, now that I am older. I wanted to do a family activity anyway with my non compliant younger brother. We don’t get to do much when we are together, and I do remember NASA being a family thing for our family when I was younger.
So I made him drive us the 2 hours there from Katy. Okay well, it took 3 hours since we stopped off to get an amazing breakfast at Kelly’s. but that’s another review: D
The outside was just as I remembered … nostalgia kicked in. My Papi holding my little hand while we walked in … him chasing me all over the front of the building … him smothering me with kisses to make me giggle uncontrollably. Ahh … the memories.
The memories were shattered when I heard my younger brother say, «God this place is expensive» … Seriously little bro? I hand my credit card to the lady behind the ticket counter. He is such a stickler sometimes lol. IMO, it’s worth ever penny. but that’s just me.
When you first walk in, it’s a little overwhelming. It’s dark lit for a reason, but your eyes adjust. To the left they have games and rides for the kiddies. And the theaters where they show the films. You know, in all the times that I have been there, I have never gone to watch any of them :/​Gonna have to change that on my next visit in December! In the center they have more interactive games for the older kids and adults. It’s pretty awesome!
They have the actual space capsules and parts of the shuttle in the main lobby area. You can go into the shuttles and walk around. Amongst that they also have the uniform displays from past shuttle launches. It’s super exciting to see how they have drastically changed during the years. Especially for the women.
My very favorite part though, is the tram tours. I wish I had remembered to get VIP tickets instead. it always drops from my mind. Anyway, there’s two (?) different tours. Pleased don’t ask me what they are. All I know is I board the tram and off we go! BUT! Before you board, you get to have your picture taken! Comes out to two or three different backgrounds … you have the option to purchase them at the end of your tour. I always purchase it.
The tram takes you though the back part of the space center where they have Mission Control rooms. and there are a lot of them. disassembled rockets, ect. They show you the offices, mess hall and such. You are even able to go into one of the Mission Control rooms. well, actually inside if you took the VIP tour. The rest of us had to stay outside in a seating area over looking. It was still pretty awesome non the less. For me, I think it was so so awesome to have been where the greats once were. The facility used to be a big thing in the hay day, and the staff that are there are really super nice. They even point out that every building has bicycles out front for the employees to use to get around the base. Go green! I kind of wish my phone hadn’t died or I would’ve taken more pictures lol.
They have a huge park area that they have planted trees for every fallen (that have either died in space or from natural causes) astronaut. I think that’s pretty cool. And being that they are such a huge base with so much greenery, there are occasional wildlife that does wander onto the grounds. There were ducks on my last visit. I heard that deer usually come to graze on the grass. Have yet to see Bambi :(
The last leg of the tour you are taken to a bunker that holds the disassembled rocket. That thing is HUGE! You think you have an idea of how big it is in your mind. But, once you actually see it in person … mannnnn were you wrong! hahaha!!!
They do have a little cafeteria in the main section of the building. the one you left when you first went to go on the tram. If I remember correctly, they have three or four different ‘restaurants’ in there to choose from. Of course Starbucks is in there! Silly goose … you’re gonna need that caffeine to get you through the day there. There’s just so much to do.
I will try to keep coming back at every visit to Houston … Since my family is now in Katy, the drive is just long. but well worth it.
Thank you Johnson Space Center for all of the great memories: D

Short review: read Joanna R’s review. She said everything I felt but much more eloquently.
Long review: I felt sad after visiting here. The main part of the Space Center is really geared towards kids. There are some interesting exhibits but most of it was for the younger set. My favorite thing was watching a video of a guy who helped fix Skylab when it was busted. It was a great story and the astronaut was a super storyteller!
The tram ride is pretty good although I don’t think our tram driver or guide took their jobs very seriously. You get to visit old Mission Control and then a training facility. Those are both interesting.
What made me sad is that everything seems kind of run down and empty. The buildings are in disrepair and the huge campus feels like a ghost town. When you’re hearing the stories of how the USA put a man on the moon with less computing power than the average smartphone, it’s very inspirational to think what was accomplished. But as you look around and see how funding cuts, other priorities and an overall lack of interest have shrunk the space program, it’s a little depressing. I guess the optimism and hope that allowed us to explore space is lost in a modern, cynical world.
If you want to revisit the glory of the past and contrast it with the reality of today, this is your place. Overall, I’m glad I went, just wish it hadn’t been so depressing.

Vor einigen Jahren bin ich auch dort gewesen. Es war absolut gigantisch!
Am Anfang hatten wir die Gelegenheit im Cockpit eine Space Shuttle zu sein. Beim Fortgang der Führung saßen wir auf einmal im Zuschauerraum im Kontrollzentrum. Das war ganz große Geschichte!
Der Eintritt ist sehr teuer. Aus meiner Sicht lohnt es sich aber.

Texas ist auch bekannt wegen der grossen Ölvorkommen.
Die Städte Dallas (schon berichtet) und Housten verdanken ihre grösse
diesen Ölvorkommen. In Housten liegt das berühmte Johnson Raumfahrtzentrum
Deshalb nun ein weiterer Ausflug nach Houston.
Die Stadt Houston selbst gefiel mir nicht so sehr.
Wir waren an einem Sonntag dort und Downtown
wirkte wie eine Totenstadt, die Stadt schien menschenleer.
Nur ein Bettler begegnete uns, mit dem Satz
«have you some cents for me» (haste mal né Mark)
Man war ja im Urlaub, deshalb gutgelaunt und grosszügig und ich gab
ihm einen Dollar. Damit zog er alsgleich von dannen.
Man sah zwar kaum Menschen, aber Woolworth war geöffnet.
Ein kurzer Einblick in dieses Kaufhaus riss mich nicht vom Hocker.
Etwas kramig, wie bei uns zu Hause.
Da die Stadt mich also nicht ansprach, wollte mein Mann und die Söhne
zum Space Center fahren, gesagt getan.
Der Eintritt mit 28,00 $ pro Person (42,-DM) fand ich etwas hoch gegriffen
Na ja, wie gesagt, man war ja im Urlaub.
Wir schlossen uns einer Weltraumführung an.
Die sehr informativ und gelungen war.
Meine Männer waren total begeistert.
Im Space-​Restaurant aßen wir Astronauten-​Eis.
Lauter kleine Kugeln, die wirklich wie leckeres Eis schmeckten.
Ein Einkauf im Merchandise-​Center schloss unseren Besuch ab.
Nartürlich auch überhöhte Preise, aber die Jacke, die mein Mann sich kaufte,
sah wirklich Klasse aus.