That seems to be the conventional scientific wisdom. The mission to get to Mars is all over the news now. I totally get the appeal of the challenge; the adventure of it all. And, it’s something that could be done, even if not all of the technology exists yet, we should be able to develop it in the next few decades. Yes. I agree. We should definitely go to Mars. We need more justification than just that though; that it would be a cool thing to do. We need reason to spend that much time and money; something that will generate the political will to take on the task of getting us there. That reason I’ve heard expressed as “Our time on this planet is limited. Whether we destroy the planet ourselves or we get hit by an asteroid, it’s only a matter of time. If we want our species to survive, we have to become multi-planetary.” I’m not buying it. It doesn’t matter what we do, our species is not going to survive. We’ll live until we blow the planet up, or an asteroid scores a direct hit. Maybe we last until the earth’s core cools enough in about three and a half billion years to make the planet uninhabitable like Mars is already. It’s just a matter of time. We could become multi-planetary as a delaying tactic, so we can last longer than the planet earth, but we’ll still run out of time. As the sun runs out of fuel and becomes a red giant in about five billion years, it will expand, enveloping the current orbit of the earth. Not much chance of surviving that. If we become inter-stellar; moving to other planets around other stars in our galaxy, that’s only another delaying tactic. The fabric of time and space continues to expand. The distance between stars and galaxies increases. Our knowledge of the Universe is limited by the speed of light. We only know what we can detect. Eventually all the stars and galaxies will be so far apart the light from one will never reach another. We will be alone in the Universe again, with no way to tell if there are any other worlds still out there; nowhere else to migrate to, and if we do survive until then, no-one will ever know. We signed up for another night.
Falcon
Barb and Henry from Sandpipers arrived this afternoon. They came out to camp for a few days too. Now not only do we have this nice state park, we have friends here too. It just keeps getting better! We signed up for another night. 
Maybe not
Still at Falcon. 2017 January trip It’s going to get a little warmer and nicer each day for the rest of the week. Wi-Fi from our Verizon jetpack was weak last night, the trip report didn’t go out until this morning, but it has been fine all day today to work, so we’ve got everything we need here. Popped over to Salineno to sit at the feeders at the DeWind’s yard. The usual suspects were there.
Saw some bird backs.
Some bird fronts too.
No hurry to leave. The birds are just starting to get used to us and the feeders in the yard. We signed up for another night.
Saw some bird backs. Some bird fronts too. No hurry to leave. The birds are just starting to get used to us and the feeders in the yard. We signed up for another night. Falcon State Park
165 miles on back highways. 2017 January trip Nice campsite.
The javelina thinks so too.
Warmer weather now. It was cool and rainy again in San Antonio. Last night at Choke Canyon, it got down to the high thirties. Only scheduled for fifty degrees for a low here tonight; it feels better already. It was warm enough to sit outside in the yard comfortably this afternoon. It should be high seventies tomorrow; but tomorrow we go home. Or maybe not.
The javelina thinks so too. Warmer weather now. It was cool and rainy again in San Antonio. Last night at Choke Canyon, it got down to the high thirties. Only scheduled for fifty degrees for a low here tonight; it feels better already. It was warm enough to sit outside in the yard comfortably this afternoon. It should be high seventies tomorrow; but tomorrow we go home. Or maybe not. Choke Creek Canyon State Park
This is nice.
It’s one of our regular stops. 2017 January trip 
Grandson Alex is in Los Angeles at a meet this weekend. He took first place on Floor and Pommel. Fourth overall. The team took second. Tomorrow. Maybe we won’t go home. Maybe we’ll go to Falcon State Park for a night.
It’s one of our regular stops. 2017 January trip Grandson Alex is in Los Angeles at a meet this weekend. He took first place on Floor and Pommel. Fourth overall. The team took second. Tomorrow. Maybe we won’t go home. Maybe we’ll go to Falcon State Park for a night.