Apollo 14

My encounter with dr. Edgar Dean Mitchell, Lunar Module Pilot Apollo 14, 6th man walking on the Moon.

Date: 31 jan 1971 – 9 feb 1971
Duration Moon walks: 1st. 4 h 47 m 50 s; 2nd. 4 h 34 m 41 s; Totaal: 9 h 22 m 31 s
Moonlanding: 5 februari 1971; 09:18:11 UTC; 3° 38' 43.08" S; 17° 28' 16.90" W; Fra Mauro (original destination of Apollo 13)
Stay on the surface of the Moon: 33 h 30 m 29 s
Lunar orbits command and service module: 34
Landing Pacific Ocean: 9 februari 1971; 21:05:00 UTC; 27° 1' S - 172° 39' W

There is a story to this. This is the short essential version of it:
It has a connection with my dads accident two days before and his passing away 9 days after the mission was completed.
I was 8 years old and made a drawing about Apollo 14 which was published in the local newspaper back then and I forgot to draw the commander stripes on the suit. That meant that instead of Alan Shepard I drew Edgar Mitchell, the astronaut that I met on 5 July 2014...
I had the sole opportunity to have him signed the photo I took of the command module "Kitty Hawk" and I was lucky enough to convey my full story to his staff in a way that they were like "ok, you have to meet him" and they made an exception for me. I am forever grateful for that.
In my collection of memorabilia I have a NASA certified piece of Apollo 14 Command Module "Kitty Hawk" and a Moon globe signed by Edgar Mitchel and Al(fred) Merrill Worden Command Module Pilot of Apollo 15
I will surely take a photo of the Apollo 14 landing site with my telescope and a Barlow 2 or maybe a stronger one in the future. I have no illusions about getting the lander visible, simply impossible from this planet with even the strongest telescope we have or even are building. But hey... it is the idea of having a nice shot of the region.

A quote of Edgar Mitchell on the overview effect after seeing the Earth from the Moon:

"You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, "Look at that, you son of a bitch.""

Edgar Mitchell referred to the Moon lander as his Moon Caravan on a somewhat sophisticated version of a camping trip.😂