Ardmore, AL: Rocket Ship Rest Stop

After leaving Nashville on Sunday morning, we continued our trek south, which had us going almost 400 miles on I-65 South through Alabama before getting to Florida. It was raining most of the time and 65 is not a particularly scenic road anyway, so the drive felt super long! We did have one stop planned in Alabama, though, so we could get our map pin in the state.

It stopped raining long enough for us to check out the Saturn IB at the Ardmore rest stop! This is the very first rest stop you come to heading south after getting into Alabama. (PS. I checked on our way back north, and it looked like you could only get to this from the southbound lanes.) It will be very hard to miss. You can see the rocket for quite a while before you get to the rest stop exit.

Eric and I have a thing for space stuff (we met at an aerospace company, after all), and Alabama liked to remind us that they do Space Stuff Here (there are a lot of billboards advertising the US Rocket & Space Center in Huntsville, which we didn't get to check out on this trip). So of course we were going to stop here.

The strange part of all of this is that this is a rest stop. I guess it's a good ploy to get people to check out your rocket if you make it part of a bathroom area...

There is also a small-scale replica of the Vietnam Memorial here, commemorating Alabama's soldiers.

It was a very interesting rest stop, to say the least.

Like any good exhibit, the rocket also has some information signs (you can click these photos to make them larger). It's also kind of like a big ad for the Space & Rocket Center, too.


Definitely stop here if you are on your way north to south through Alabama, even if you don't need the rest area. It's a great feeling to be so close to something so incredibly large and cool.