Often viewed in TV cop shows set in Chicago, the Adler Planetarium is set out on a pier into Lake Michigan. Besides the planetarium, it houses many exhibits.
Prominent outside is a staue of Nicolaus Copernicus
Largest natural hole in the ground, well one of them, the Barringer Meteor Crater in Arizona.
Astronauts trained here and it has featured in several movies, including Starman.
Actually this is a 'space site'. Cinder Lake in northern Arizona, near Flagstaff, was where the Apollo Lunar Rover was tested.
Craters were blasted into the 'Lunar-like' surface, though these have long been obliterated.
The Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, Arizona.
Pluto was discovered here in 1930 by Clyde Tombaugh.
The NASA probe New Horizons sped past the planet/ dwarf planet/ whatever in July 2015
The Roswell town sign doesn't mention 'UFOs' - but does mention Robert Goddard. But there's nothing left to see of the launch site - just a marker stone, on which I am sitting! Otherwise the landscape looks pretty much as it did in his time
But Roswell also has the UFO Museum, housed in an old cinema.
And you can have your picture taken with an alien... (This works with either of us saying this...)
One of the National Parks in the southwest USA, Bryce Canyon in Utah.
Amongst the strange rock formations is Thor's Hammer - right
Largest radio telescope in the world, the 27 dishes of the Very Large Array, Socorro, New Mexico.
It is arranged in a Y formation and this 'Y' shape can can just be made out in the view from the air, right
The Whipple Observatory on Mount Hopkins, in southern Arizona.
The Multi-Mirror Telescope building is seen on the mountain top, left, while this is reflected - upside down - in the strange Gamma Ray Telescope - right
The White Sands Missile Range in southern New Mexico.
Featured is the Missile Park with examples of those rockets test fired over the years since WWII from the Range.
The Griffith Observatory on the outskirts of Los Angeles.
Besides being major observatory in its own right, it is often seen as a location in movies and TV, including NCIS-LA and Episodes.
Largest collection of natural arches in the world - the Arches National Park in Utah.
Left: part of the North and South Windows, also called 'The Spectacles'; right Delicate Arch, the State symbol
Pima Air & Space Museum in Tucson, south Arizona, is the third largest such museum in the USA.
Right 'MATS' isn't me, but fun to point out, left. And it's not all American - here a restored RAF Avro Shackleton
The Titan Missile Museum is part of the Pima Museum. It is the only such missile site that remains with the missile still inside the silo under the blast door - right.
Perhaps one should add that the missile isn't fuelled...
This is 'The 'Boneyard', America's main storage of military planes. Located at Davis-Monthan AF Base, Tucson, it is not part of Pima, but the tours start from there.
The photo (right) of a 'Stealth Fighter' shows someone has a sense of humour...
Mount Wilson Observatory, in the San Gabriel Mountains, overlooking Los Angeles.
This houses several large telescopes including the 100 inch (left) and the 150 foot Solar Tower (right)
The nearest mere mortals are likely to get to Area 51 in Nevada, the small town of Rachel.
There you can find the Little A'Le'Inn and down the road 'the white mail box'...
Home of Mission Control for manned space missions the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. On display is a replica Lunar Rover (see Crater Lake above), while this is one the last shots of the Saturn V still out in the open. It has since been covered.
Located near Tucson, Arizona, Biosphere 2 has run enclosed- environment experiments for many years.
And if you are wonder why '2', well Biosphere 1 is the Earth itself. ...
Straddling the Utah - Arizona border, Monument Valley has featured in countless movies. Left - Merrick Butte - perhaps the most identifiable feature.
Right: from US Highway 163 looking south towards Monument Valley.
