I'll be visiting KSC in just over a week. Has anyone here been there recently? Any tips on what to see or what not to bother with would be greatly appreciated. I assume the IMAX movie(s) is/are wonderful. Are there more than one?? Are some more enjoyable than others????

I haven't been there in 10 years, and don't know what's on the public tours vs. what we got to do when I was TDY there, but after your day there try the rock shrimp at Dixie Crossroads in Titusville. Be warned it's a long wait on the weekend. They had an all-you-can eat special; one of our guys put down ten dozen in one sitting.

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I was there about 7 or 8 years ago (so not recently) with my wife, who tolerates my space interest (I love her anyway). At the time they had two tours you could do, a more historical one, where you see the pads for the Mercury, Gemini and similar missions, and a more current one, where you go by the pads for the shuttles, the VAB, etc. We are in line for tickets and she asks "which one do you want to do"? I probably looked about 6 years old; what do you mean "one"?

We did the modern one and it was great. I'll have to get back some time.

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I was there last year and found that things had changed a lot since my first visit in1993.
The bus tours are good, you get on one bus that takes you part way, you can then get off and take your time looking around, then get another bus to take you to the next part etc. So you can spend as much or as little time at each stop as you like. The drivers are a good source of information, ours told me that during a shuttle launch, as the sound waves pass over the water near the VIP seating, fish leap out of the water!
I enjoyed the "Talk to an astronaut" feature, (I didn't thing of any realy good questions until I was driving back!)
Looking at the equipment used for the Apollo missions realy made me realise how long ago it was (I feel so old!)
I think that there are about 3 IMAX shows to watch.
But nothing can beat my first visit when I got to watch a shuttle launch, I have never heard anything so loud! I have seen launches on tv and assumed that the crackling noise was due to the microphones not being able to handle the sound level, but that machine crackles!

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The meek will inherit the earth ... the rest of us will go to the stars.

I second sts60's recommendations re Dixie Crossroads. It's almost as much fun and tasty as enjoying the throwed rolls and other delights at Lamberts.

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You could do the Lunch with an astronaut thing. Kind of expensive, 60$ or more.

This is somewhat sadly nostalgic, but the last time my son and I visited Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center, we got to see, very up close (it was on the launch pad), the space shuttle Columbia.

She looked like she was already going Mach 25, but at the time I still had misgivings about using solid boosters for manned flight. Fortunately a few weeks later everything seemed to work OK, even with those missing tiles on the OMS shrouds.

The first time I was at the Cape was in April, 1961, to see Alan Shepard's MR-3, during which visit Yuri Gagarin orbited the Earth, but didn't land according to FIA rules.

How ironic that an old woman, her grand-daughter, and a cow were the first beings to see him return to Earth.

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I've only been there twice... early 70s & early 90s.
I would suggest the highest priority would be the tours. Get yourself very familiar with a map of the facilities so you can keep things in perspective. That is something that I wish I was familiar with in the 90s trip. My cousin was stationed there, and gave me a personal tour. It was so personal that I needed to hide my camera in some areas.
The same with the 70's trip... I don't remember much about the relics, museum, etc. But do cherish seeing where things happened, and many of the actual rockets on display. (in fact, I saw the actual apollo-soyuz linkup module close-up)
There are some important, one of a kind things in the museum... but some of it can be seen in many of the museums around the country. So, don't spend a lot of time on some of the more common items.
I-Max is good, but it takes time, and there are opportunities to see it outside of the cape.

An event that is very unlikely to happen when one choses to land in the middle of the ocean rather than in the tundra .

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Thanks, everyone, for some great ideas!

Pass 'em along! I'm splurging for the lunch with an astronaut, ---- if anyone has some really good questions, I'll try to ask and post the responses.

Which reminds me --- I need to check who will be at the lunch that day.

KSC is great, it was fun to eat lunch under an actual Saturn V, even if the hotdog cost as much as a good restaurant meal (maybe it was built to NASA specs).

Make sure you get tickets for the Up Close tour; you might even want reservations if it is a busy day. My tour was led by a retired engineer rather than some high school kid, so it was actually very interesting (unlike the similar tour I took at Mission Control in Houston).

Last time I was at KSC was right after they re-opened the Up Close tour following Sept. 11th, and they still didn't have the International Space Station facility open for the tour; I think it is back on the tour now, so I really want to go again. I also still haven't been on the Cape Canaveral tour. Maybe while I'm at Smyrna Beach in November... *drool*

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I was there back in January and it was awesome!!

I crash-landed the shuttle simulator 6 or 7 times before finally giving up.

As I said, a shuttle launch is VERY noisy from the outside, I wonder how loud it is from inside the orbiter?

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The meek will inherit the earth ... the rest of us will go to the stars.

Well, since the exaust noise is directed away from the shuttle, it is going to be much quieter inside. Noisy I'm sure--though the closest I've come to being in a launch is Mission: Space at Epcot (and I took the Green mission... I'll never go into space until someone cures motion sickness).

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Is the simulator something you need to sign up for in advance? Or does everyone just take their turn? (In which case, getting there off-peak would presumably be the best strategy.)

Everyone just takes their turn. There are several, at least six if I recall correctly, so there wasn't much of a wait when I was there.