The so-called lunar loo malfunctioned as soon as the Artemis II crew reached orbit Wednesday evening. Mission Control guided astronaut Christina Koch through some plumbing tricks and she finally got it going.

The bad news is that it's so cold inside the Orion capsule—65 degrees Fahrenheit (18 degrees Celsius)—that the four astronauts are digging into suitcases for long-sleeved clothes. Mission Control is trying to warm things up.

The three Americans and one Canadian are on track to bust out of orbit around Earth on Thursday night and zoom to the moon for a lunar fly-around. It will be Mission Control's first translunar injection since Apollo's swan song in 1972.

Until then, the astronauts are savoring the views of Earth from tens of thousands of miles (kilometers) high. Koch told Mission Control that they can make out the entire coastlines of continents and even the South Pole, her old stomping ground.

"It is just absolutely phenomenal," radioed Koch, who spent a year at an Antarctic research station before joining NASA.

The mission is due to end with a Pacific splashdown on April 10. NASA is counting on the test flight to kickstart the entire Artemis program and lead to a moon landing by two astronauts in 2028. Orion's toilet may need some design tweaks before that happens.