As winds and rain filled pummeled the Guadalupe Mountains, I made my escape east into the heart of Texas. I would have gone to Big Bend, but massive storms made their way south at the same time...so I decided I would skip out on this trip, at least for now.
I visited a friend in Waco, TX who works at SpaceX. Waco is a town just south of Dallas. Located on the Chisholm Trail where drovers would take their longhorns and do trading, it is home to the Baylor Bears. Also, Waco’s Suspension Bridge over the Brazos River is the longest single-span suspension bridge west of the Mississippi when it was completed in 1870. Since then it is known for the Branch Davidians and a shootout between biker gangs and local police. But it's also known for some good things like Chip and JoJo Gaines on HGTV's Fixer Upper show and who run a pretty successful store called Magnolia Markets in the heart of town.
To acquaint myself with Texas, I first got to try some good ol' fashioned Texas BBQ.
..and some chicken fried steak.
But ultimately, I was interested in taking a tour of the SpaceX Test facility. SpaceX has sites all over the US. The main HQ being in Hawthorne, CA. Their test facility, or the facility where all rockets are tested right before launch, is in Waco. I got to see where they test the Dragon, Falcon 9, and Falcon Heavy boosters. The facility was originally a Navy Ammunition testing facility and was then acquired by Beal Aerospace Co. before becoming SpaceX's main testing campus. Very impressive stuff! I even got to go out to the middle of the field where they keep the SpaceX Grasshopper spacecraft. This was one of the original test articles to prove that a rocket could take off and land back at its original site. Check out the video below!
