14 DAY TRIAL // Curiosity is done sitting around and is getting ready for the longest journey of its – admittedly – short life. The Mars rover is done analyzing the contents of a second rock it drilled into.
Now, laying ahead of it is an eight-kilometer (five-mile) trek across the Martian landscape towards its destination at the foothills of the massive Mount Sharp.
"We're hitting full stride," said Mars Science Laboratory Project Manager Jim Erickson of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
"We needed a more deliberate pace for all the first-time activities by Curiosity since landing, but we won't have many more of those," he added.
There are no more planned drillings or scooping at Curiosity's current site, where it's been for the past few months.
That said, that doesn't mean the rover will make a straight dash towards its destination. If it encounters anything interesting along the way it will stop, look around, and investigate.