The NASA launch pad from which Apollo 11 lifted off for the first manned moon landing and Atlantis left Earth to fly the last space shuttle mission is now open to the public for tours.

Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida is the latest, limited-time tour stop being offered by the NASA spaceport's visitor complex. The tours which also include separate trips to KSC's 52-story tall Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) and the Launch Control Center (LCC) are now being offered as part of the center's 50th anniversary celebration.

"These are very rare opportunities that NASA has worked with us to provide to our visitors from Florida, across the United States and overseas," Bill Moore, chief operating officer of NASA's Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, said in a statement. "With exciting new space exploration programs coming to the Kennedy Space Center, we may never have access to such historic places like this again."

Pad 39A was one of two large launch complexes built in the 1960s to support the Saturn V launches to the moon, Saturn IB launches to the Skylab space station and space shuttle launches to deploy and service satellites and build the International Space Station.

Pad 39A's twin, Pad 39B, was stripped of its iconic launch support towers last year to make way for possible future commercial and government launch vehicles. Pad 39A, which supported 92 launches since November 1967 12 Saturn V rockets and 80 shuttles is being maintained to support NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) heavy-lift next generation booster now being developed. [Giant Leaps: Biggest Moments in Spaceflight]

- Bill Moore, Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex COO

The current downtime between launches has allowed the opportunity for the visitor complex to bring guests closer to the launch pad than ever before.

Past the perimeter

The new "KSC Up-Close: Launch Pad Tour" buses guests from the visitor complex to Pad 39A, following alongside the same river stone-lined "crawlerway" that rockets and shuttles once slowly rumbled across riding atop massive tank-like transporters. Previous bus tours drove this same path but then veered off to circle the security fence that surrounds the launch pad.

On the new tour, the guards stationed at the pad will wave the bus forward, permitting the tour to proceed almost a quarter-mile (400 meters) within the pad's perimeter.

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NASA opens Apollo launch site to the public