Both literal and figurative, drove to the SUNSHINE State and slept in our car a few nites to save on hotels because of the scrubs, man, watta sight and the view at night looking at the whole vehicle stack with the WHITE EXTERNAL TANK was .....beautiful. A guy had telescope set up by the hotel parking lot, and thru it we could see the BEANIE CAP and the LOX venting.. Columbia's WINDOWS, too. Who put's windows THAT BIG in a spacecraft? WAY COOOOOOLLLLL!! No sleep that nite and when the shuttle took off......LOUD!!!!! No water supression system yet and ascent seemed quick compared to SATURN 5's.......EVERYBODY CHEERED when it lifted off. Then on to mooch from a distant realtive in ORLANDO and then a few days in DISNEY WORLD.