Visitors came today. They came by bus. Two of them. Yellow ones. Filled with 40 energetic students in grades K-6th from Hanksville Elementary and Caineville Elementary schools plus teachers and parents. This was the first expedition for these students to MDRS and what an adventure they had.

With a morning "briefing" by Commander Clancey, the students listened as "attentively" as possible to the history of the MDRS and the mission for Crew 16. Divided into groups, the students were led on a tour of the Hab. As they entered the airlock and the EVA room, our "lil' astronauts" tried on helmets for the space suits and were shown the rest of the gear.

Next stop on their tour was the science lab in the first floor where we study our rocks and currently have set up shop for the computer models and ERA. Out the back hatch students saw the observatory and took a tour of Everest, the Pressurized Rover we have at MDRS.

Forty children and teachers from the schools of Hanksville and Caineville approach MDRS at 08:45.	Everyone gathers for an introduction to MDRS
Bill Clancey welcomes the group, telling them how we are going to explore and live in space, just as people before us braved the unknown to explore the earth.	Brent Garry, Space Cowboy, shows he's just an ordinary guy.
A child explains that he doesn't want to be an astronaut; he's going to be a construction worker. We explained that there will be plenty of things to build on Mars!	After the introduction, small groups received a tour of the hab's lower deck from Maarten Sierhuis.