We left the hotel on Monday at 6:30am, aka "oh my god o'clock", but it was worth it for the amazing sunset behind the Kremlin and down the Moscow River. We also passed a status of Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, made out of titanium. It looks a little like Ironman. Apparently in the 80s, it was referred to as RoboCop. I guess the Russians weren't as isolated from Western culture as we thought! We weren't able to get a picture, but thanks to Google image search, this is what it looked like.
Yuri as RoboCop
The flight was a private charter just for our group. Business class is so pedestrian! The sides of the plane are lined with couches, with tables in front of them. 8 people per cabin which would hold about 25 people on commercial cattle class. Champagne and OJ was served before we took off. Later, I asked for a tea, and the attendant brought me tea and a huge slice of tiramisu cake. After a quick photo of part of the plane, we were told "No pictures!" So we don't have many.
In Baikonour, we were allowed into the country without visas on the condition that we were escorted through town and into the Cosmodrome, a base in the middle of nowhere which is still considered part of Russia. But we were permitted a quick stop at the Soyuz rocket displayed at the side of the road. UG giggled like a little girl at the opportunity.
Back on the bus, we drove for about an hour on bumpy roads through the desert. We passed a few Soviet era missile silos, including rubble from some that were destroyed at the end of the cold war. We then got to stop at an access gate to get a "close up" of our rocket. We couldn't get closer than about a 1/4 mile, due to safety restrictions, since the rocket is filled with fuel. Next stop was the Gagarin museum, which houses, among other space artifacts, a life size model of the Buran shuttle, used for wind testing. We were allowed to get into the cockpit. This was the most amazing thing so far, as this museum can't be accessed by the general public. You can't get into the Cosmodrome without special permission, so the only people who have ever been here are related to the space industry. It was the museum curator's birthday, so she welcomed us with a spread of food, champagne and vodka.
There was a possibility of also visiting a facility where the rockets and satellites are assembled and prepared, and the guides were warning us that going to both the prep hall and the museum would mean missing dinner. UG and I, along with others, were fine with this after big breakfasts, snacks on the plane and on the bus, and promise of food later while watching the launch. And we made this choice without even knowing about the food at the museum. We ended up not getting permission to see the prep hall due to whatever is currently being prepared. So after a few moments at the hotel, we walked over to the dining hall for a full 3 course meal. Immediately after dinner, we head next door to the Proton Club, essentially a community centre for the base, where we would watch the launch. There was a full banquet laid out there. If we had known this was going to be available, we would probably have preferred to miss dinner even without the extra tour. I was also still burping caviar from lunch on Sunday.
At about 12:30am, we got to see the event that started this whole trip. The launch! The weather was windy, and very cloudy, which meant we wouldn't see much. But as the sun set, the wind died down, and about an hour before launch, the clouds cleared unexpectedly.
Complete success! This was my second ever live launch, the first being 12 years ago of Endeavor from Cape Canaveral. It's so much more awesome than a video, even a live feed. When you're there, you can actually feel the sound. There's also the emotion of all the people nearby. In this case, 4 years of planning, design, and building have gone into this satellite and the rocket itself. The nerves and excitement of the people who have participated in that add something that I'm just not a good enough writer to describe. I almost cried myself out of joy.
In addition to the initial lift off, when the rocket has reached a certain height, it drops it's first ignition engine, and then has a second propulsion system. Later it drops that and moves on to a third. It's considered a good viewing if you get to see the fire of the second stage. Due to the weather, we saw the burst of the 3rd stage, and watched the light for a couple more minutes. This lasted a total of about 5 minutes. We were both too busy watching to take video or pictures. Plus there were dozens of other people filming, including a live broadcast. A video of the launch is posted here: Launch Video
We then headed back inside the club, where we heard regular updates from mission control that various milestones that we couldn't see were being met. Lots of toasts and exclamations of "so far, so good!" There is a lot of superstition with rocket launches, and as much as people want to celebrate the point they've reached, it's not done until the satellite is no longer used, in about 30 years.
At about 2am, we headed to a barbeque and camp fire held by the mission team, the people who actually build and prepared the rocket and satellite. You know, because we needed more food! Most of the banquet was untouched. UG and I finally got to bed at 3am, but the party was still going strong. The camp fire left a nasty smell on our clothes, apparently they were burning more than wood. UG suggested railway ties. So now we're walking around wearing eau de Kazakhstan campfire.
At breakfast, we got the news that the satellite had been fully separated from the rocket, which is a call for more champagne. We then packed up our stuff and got back on the bus to head back to the airport. The whirlwind trip to Kazakhstan has come to an end. Back on the private charter, we were served lunch and most people slept. We landed in Moscow and had a short time to rest and prepare for dinner.
Dinner was a post-launch party held at an imperial era mansion turned into a restaurant, called Turandot. We had a private dining room where the decor caused me to expect trumpets to announce a king walking in at any moment. I got a ride, and UG walked there. It took the car about 35 minutes, while UG walked it in 15. Moscow's inner city traffic is pretty spectacular. Intersections get blocked, and nobody moves. We had dumplings and duck spring rolls as appetizers, which were amazing. After dinner, some of us went in search of a bar for a few more celebratory drinks. We found a place that they had been to a few nights before, but it wasn't as good as they remembered. It was smoky, expensive ($20 for a martini), slow, and under stocked. They didn't have any Russian vodkas, or tonic. We would have been out of there in 10 minutes, but it took about 45 to get drinks for the whole table, and then the bill.
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