@SuperDicq @CmdrTaco It's not insane at all - it was the fastest and cheapest way.

If they used a boat, they would have to transport it to a dock, work out how to load it onto a boat (they'd need some impressive crane that works with a dock that is large enough and also doesn't fall over) and then the boat would take days transporting the shuttle to the destination (which exposes the shuttle to salt water spray and there is also the possibility of encountering a storm on the way too) and then they would need to unload it from the boat and transport it from the dock to the launch center.

Instead they just flew a 747 directly to the landing airport, put the landed shuttle on it and flew it directly to the Kennedy Space Center within a few hours (which had a very slim chance of encountering storms and planes are also capable of flying around storms) and landed on Kennedy's runway, ready to be moved a short distance to be prepped for another launch.