Destination: Udvar-Hazy Center

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A few weeks ago, a couple friends and I made the trek out into the Northern Virginia suburbs to spend the day at the Udvar-Hazy Center to watch the movie, Interstellar, at the center’s IMAX theatre. The Stephen F. Udvar-Hazy Center is the National Air and Space Museum’s annex location, the main one located on The Mall in downtown DC. This was my first time visiting the Center (pronounced “ood-VAR HAH-zee”), and I’d highly recommend a visit, especially if you’re interested in space and aviation.

While waiting for the movie to begin, here’s what I found:

Entrance to Udvar-Hazy

Udvar Hazy Entrance

Watching planes land at Dulles from the watchtower at Udvar-Hazy.

Watching planes land at Dulles

Birds eye view of one of the hangars at Udvar-Hazy. 

Udvar-Hazy Hangar

The infamous Enola Gay. 

The Enola Gay

An old Boeing 367-80.

Boeing 767-80 at Udvar-Hazy

An Air France Concorde.

Air France Concorde 

The Capsule used in Red Bull’s Stratos Jump

Red Bull Stratos Capsule

The U.S. Space Shuttle Discovery

US Space Shuttle - Front US Space Shuttle - 2 US Space Shuttle - 3

HOURS OF OPERATION:

  • Udvar-Hazy is open daily, 10:00am – 5:30pm

TRAVEL TIPS

  • Using Metro, it takes about 90 minutes to get here from downtown DC.
  • Watch a movie at the IMAX Theatre
  • See the US Space Shuttle Discovery
  • See the Air France Concorde
  • See the Lockheed SR-71 BlackBird. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a pic of this 🙁

GETTING HERE

DIRECTIONS

  1. Take the Silver Line to Wiehle-Reston East Metro station.
  2. Transfer to Fairfax Connector Bus No. 983 to Udvar-Hazy Center.

See Bus 983 Timetable

  • Udvar-Hazy to Wiehle Reston: Buses run between 9:30 am – 7:10 pm, departing Udvar Hazy every :10, :30, and :50 on the hour.
  • Wiehle Reston to Udvar – Hazy: Buses run between 9:00 am – 6:20 pm, departing Wiehle Reston roughly every 20 minutes.