Traveling to the Moon has been a dream, just like so many others in human history, that over the years has come true thanks to science.
From the 2nd century onwards, numerous writers and scientists dreamed of traveling to the Moon: from the Greek Lucian of Samosata, to Dante, Copernicus, Kepler, Cyrano de Bergerac, Edgar Allan Poe, Jules Verne, H.G Wells or Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. These are fantasy journeys in rowing boats, in ships guided by geese, or in a flaming chariot like the one used by Orlando Furioso to recover his sanity after a heartbreak. Despite their lack of scientific rigor, these pieces express a universal desire that science turned into reality in 1969, when the Apollo 11 spacecraft successfully completed the first manned mission to the Moon surface.
We have all read, watched or listened to stories, novels or films about journeys to the Moon. We suggest a game based on these experiences and on your intuition:
On the dais you will find an Earth and Moon built to scale. The Moon is approximately 4 times smaller than the Earth and is attached to a guide rail that allows you to move it. Move the Moon away from the Earth until you think that it is at the right distance. Of course, don’t search for it on the Internet.
Here’s a clue: in 1969, the Apollo 11 spacecraft took about 76 hours to reach lunar orbit.
The last manned mission that landed on the Moon was Apollo 17 in 1972. The next step in the explorations of our natural satellite will be the NASA Artemis manned missions, which will take a woman and an Afro-American to the Moon for the first time. One of the aims of the Artemis programme will be to explore the surface and establish a lunar base which will provide the first step for the next big leap: sending the first astronauts to Mars.