I watched the live stream on the NASA website until the actual launch at 4:05 a.m. and then rushed out to my balcony armed with my old camera and looked West. The Pacific ocean is about 65 miles west of Pasadena and the flight path was supposed to be along the coast.
Less than a minute later a red dot rose up in the distance. And less than thirty seconds after that it disappeared from my sight behind a towering eucalyptus tree on its way to Mars in May, 2018
