A Russian-based company, Orbital Technologies, has announced plans to launch a seven-room luxury hotel into orbit, about 220 miles from the Earth, within five years. A five-day vacation package will cost under $1 million, including up to three months of specialized training, return flight aboard a Russian Soyuz or one of the commercial space planes that will soon be operational, three nights in one of the hotel's zero-gravity cabins, and a sightseeing flight around the moon.
If that still sounds expensive, consider that the last "space tourist", Cirque du Soleil founder Guy LaLiberte, paid upwards of $25 million for his tourist jaunt to the International Space Station aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft just two years ago. "Space tourism is a real and fast-growing business," Sergei Kostenko, head of Orbital Technologies, said last week. "Whoever builds the first new spaceship now will reap big dividends."
Conditions aboard the planned Commercial Space Station (CSS) will be more comfortable than official astronauts enjoy in the line of duty, but there will still be no shower (sponge baths only), guests will have to use vacuum toilets, and all meals will be specially prepared "space food," measured out and packed before launch. Absolutely no alcoholic beverages will be served, but there will be Internet access and a full array of satellite TV channels
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