About 25 years ago, some engineer came up with a brilliant use for an EM shield, translucent metal, artificial gravity fields and a beach. At least that was the model I was on. To whoever that was that created these things, thank you! Here’s my experience on one of these marvels.

So, Allister, my friend at the university, called me up and said, lets go for a ride. I said, ok, I didn’t have any work to do anyway. We met outside and drove over the DC regional space port. We didn’t have time for an Space Elevator, so we commissioned a rocket transport to take us to a station that I hadn’t heard of before. Allister called it the Bubble Station. I thought it was an odd name, it really didn’t look like a bubble. It was an odd design, five type three Bigelow modules stacked horizontally on top of each other. From each junction point there were four long docking collars extending outward for about a mile in seperate directions. Attached to each collar were anywhere from two to a half a dozen, what can only be described as, bubbles. They were, of course, Bubble Yacht’s. For some reason I just had never gotten to see these things. Allister told me that they are exclusively for the ultra rich. There were only around 100 of these things in existance.

How we, two ordinary universities professors, were getting on this thing was simply beyond me. And I didn’t ask once. I didn’t want to spoil the moment with the logistics of how this moment came to be. We docked with the station and made our way to collar 5. The ride on the space car was almost as intense as the whole experience.  We went by three other yachts on our way to ours. They were sights to behold. Each one was roughly 1 acre and each one had totally different interiors. Allister would later tell me that there were other models on differen collars that were much smaller. The acre sized ones here were the biggest on this station. But that someone had once built a ten acre bubble yacht. Incredible! No one ever talks about it so I’m sure it’s hidden away in some corner of the system. A mini-translucent bubble world.

The first we saw had a small forest on it! I couldn’t believe it when I saw it. Something as simple as a forest. There was a nice lodge and a small cottage. I could see birds flying through the trees and even some squirls in the trees. I even spotted a large tree house up in the trees. There didn’t seem to be anyone home but I could only imagine what it would be like to drift through the heavens sitting on that porch.

The second ship had two structures on it. One was large house with a partial roof. If you have your own atmosphere, why do you need a roof after all. The other building was, amazingly, what looked like a farm building. I couldn’t tell how far it went down but it went up nearly to the top of the bubble. Little bit of an eye sore if you ask me but the intention is clear. This bubble was meant to be self sustaining. Some billionare’s idea to detach one day and sail off never to be heard from again most likly.

The third ship was stunning. There was a small island in the center of the ship. Water surrounded. There were a few small row boats and even a three man sail boat on the water. Imagine that, a boat inside a bubble floating through space. I could see a few people sitting on the boats, one of them waved.

We made it the end of collar five, got out of the car and went to the docking ring. A few moments through the interlock chambers and there we were. On a beach. In a bubble. In Space. Wow. This one was just as neat as the others. A small beach, small amount of water to simulate an ocean and a few small cottages lining the shore. It was simply incredible.

The owner of the bubble came out to greet us. Or at least I thought it was the owner, he seemed like he was. He immediatly introduced himself simply as Tom and began to give us a tour. He never asked who we were, he must have already known. Tom walked us along the beach, describing the construction of the ship, how the EM fields work, the translusent metal, the propulsion system built beneath us. It was really incredible to hear about these ships. Aparantly, most of the big ones are our in the system somewhere. A few are even serving as ultra luxury hotels.

It was to my dismay that we weren’t going to go anywhere. The ride on the bubble ship was more of a sitting on the beach and looking at the view of earth below us. Still very neat. What’s even neater is Tom told us that sometimes they’ll suspend the gravity and let you float around a bit. They have to lock down the water so it doesn’t go all over the place and do a few safty procedures but it would be very cool to experience.

We sat on the beach for awhile and headed home. It was a fun day to be sure. As soon as I got home I started this post. I’ll be looking for one of the hotels next. I think I want to plan a vacation to a bubble hotel, I saw that one is currently at the Jupiter system. That would be an amazing view!

For those who do not know what these are, they are relatively new, a history telescope is one that looks back in time. Now, for all you astronomers out there, yes, all telescopes do this. But what if you pointed one at the earth? Depending on how far away you are from the planet, you will see something back in time.

The lecture today was about a recent experiment into this concept. The light from the Earth takes time to get to Jupiter, about three hours. A team of researchers operating in the jupiter system pointed a telescope back to earth. They then broad casted the signal on a few vNet’s. Since the vNet signals are faster than light, the transmitted signal was actually three hours old compared to the time it was being viewed on earth. They broad casted the visual signal as well as the vNet feed and the researchers. It was a little bit disturbing.

The power of space based telescopes has increased quite a lot in the past few centuries. You can see vivid detail from Jupiter with the new Orion space telescope model. Not to mention what you can see from other systems.

Ok, so, what good is three hours? Not much. Sure it’s a novelty thing. Yes, you can be on vSpace and watch something on earth from three hours ago. Neat. But three hours isn’t enough for historical observations. It is good, however, for the future uses.

There are two primary projects currently going on, big science projects as they used to be called, the kind that can only be funded by governments, that can make use of this new concept. The first, there are plans at work to build a super Orion telescope. Something so big it’s nearly the size of a military carrier. Once built, the plan is to point it towards some distant location and let it speed away. They are going to build it in the Minerva Asteroid shipyards and shoot it off. Now, it won’t get anywhere anytime soon. But, it will get there. Eventually it will reach a point that is many light years from earth, allowing historians to turn it around and view the history of our planet. Neat isn’t it? Personally though, I don’t think this will ever happen. Some big science projects promise a lot but are just too big or would take too long to see any benefits. I think this is one.

The other method is far more interesting. It involves the new gravity drives that are going to be tested in the coming years. These things promise everything. Imagine going to another star system in minutes. Incredible. If they ever get this to work, something to do with shrinking space in front and growing it behind, they’ll slap one on an Orion telescope ship, send it 300 years out and turn it around. That’s when things will get interesting.

How it all works? Beats the hell out of me. I don’t understand gravity drives or how they can see anything from 300 light years away. But, I guess I have to start learning. This new discipline, Historical Astronomy, is gaining some steam. The physicists swear this new gravity engine will work and unlock the galaxy to exploration. And we have plenty of earth like planets to play with out there. Of course, there isn’t a telescope built yet to view that far away. The super Orion, they still are debating a name for this class of ship, is only on the drawing board. But when it’s built we may be able to see clouds on a distant planet. That alone is fascinating. The future will be very interesting for certain!