Land of Salvation, What Ails Thee? Options

[ustrax]

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Each roving day as the last.
Beyond the horizon, beyond the border, roving until the last Sol, through lands of wonder, towards unexpected goals. Each roving day as the last.

Beyond the Columbia Hills, island in a sea of basalt, towards the East, lays Terre de Salvaesche, Land of Salvation, where Parzival reached the Grail’s Castle and found the answer for his Quest. Impossible quest…Incredible quest!
Towards a Kingdom where forests of mesas and knobs rule, where, from the North, the hills of Thira announce their protection, glowing in dark red under Mars’ dusk, where sand tides fustigates its beaches, where boulders align along paths that lead no where.
Land of Salvation! Home of the Grail! Receptacle of Answers!


The Land of Salvation…how valuable is it in scientific terms?
Aren’t we seing there, far in the horizon, signs of a past where glaciers imposed they’re presence on Gusev crater? Aren’t we seing there signs of an ancient, majestic, ice kingdom retreating? Aren’t we seing the reliques of a battle between the fiery lava and a mighty frozen kingdom?
This special cookie of yours sees…and dreams, a time where glaciers and volcanoes coexisted, where gentle waves, reflecting a dim sun, danced a silent tune on the surface of kettle lakes.

Just close your eyes for a second, imagine yourself standing in the plains, contemplating that enticing, unknown, territory, imagine, the sound, the light and the landscape in front of you, imagine your inquiring march, dustful step after dustful step, getting closer and closer to the Land’s walls…

The rovers are our eyes on Mars we read…I want to see myself standing in the plains, contemplating that enticing, unknown, territory.
Just close your eyes for a second, for the time you which, and imagine, the sound, the light and the landscape, in front of you.

You, Counts of Engineering, Barons of Algorithms, Dukes of Geology, fan the flames of the bonfire with your words of Impossibility!
Give me distances! Give me the cold truth about the Spirit! But give me also what could we earn from this quest...

An aging, crippled rover, a too vast desert to cross…
An aging, crippled rover, is for now dreaming, listening to a distant murmur in the mute vastness of Gusev:…”Ride, boldly ride”…

Land of Salvation, unreachable they say…

Recommended reading: Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival
Recommended soundtrack: Richard Wagner's Parsifal

[BrianL]

And this in from the Mars colony...

A crowd estimated at around 1000 was on hand at Ma'adim Vallis today to welcome the arrival of the intrepid rover Spirit, launched decades ago. Blind without any cameras, with one working wheel dragging it slowly along as the now famous Repeat Ad Infinitum drive command sent just before contact was lost executed in its memory banks, the rover rolled into the throng until its progress was halted by a sushi cart. Never one to miss a photo opportunity, Colony Constable Ellison presented the rover with a ticket for driving without a license, and failure to maintain the posted minimum speed.