Rusted Sky

To take a look at their website, check it out here. It's actually rather magnificent, in an egyptian pyramid sort of way. Whole lot of work done, great engineering for the time, now with extra sand dunes...

Hello! Just wanted to drop you a quick line and tell you what we thought of our visit to your facility...

I must admit that the first view of the Biosphere is pretty darn impressive. But the facilities around it... the whole thing felt a lot like a ghost town. A well-built and meticulously cleaned and maintained ghost town, but abandoned by the living.

(My first thought on seeing the student quarters was 'how great it would be to stay here for the night'. Sadly, the lack of anyplace nearby to eat would have made that a bad idea, especially seeing the snack bar seems to be closed permanently. Then I thought "What about turning this into a haven for amateur astronomy?" You're far enough out from Tucson that skyglow shouldn't be much of a problem, and you've recently installed the 24 inch telescope - I'd think the crossover would be a natural thing...)

The tour guide, a gray-haired gentlemen with a vague accent, gave the tour in the manner of someone who's given it one too many times and is very bored with all these ignorant tourists passing through.

I have followed the Biosphere 2 story with some interest since it's inception, and the movie in the visitor center was quite good. I was surprised to see that the Biosphere's open to the elements now, and that ants were doing a great job of colonization.

On departure, the gift shop was a bit odd... we'd been touring the SW for the last week and a half, and it was rather bizzare to come across someplace as historic as this that had only one postcard type available. Admittedly this is a research facility rather than a commercial operation, but it was kind of puzzling. I would have liked to have gotten several professional views, and would have been interested in buying one of the schematic prints of the Biosphere that were so displayed around the entrance, but they weren't available. I tend to pick up books about the places we visit on vacation and would have gladly gotten something about the history of the Biosphere 2 project. But such was not to be had.

In closing, I have to say that there was a very surreal air about the whole facility. It's waiting, almost sleeping, and I only hope that the next time we swing through there we find it wide awake and active again.

J.