Newspaper
The Sun
GALACTIC SUITE
(United Kingdom)
GREAT HOTEL… £2M FOR 3 NIGHTS… BUT NO ATMOSPHERE
BOOKING soon: the one package holiday that’s out of this world – with a price to match.
The most expensive break in history will set you back £2MILLION.
The good news is transfers are included, which is just as well – because you are paying for a three-night stay in outer space.
The first guests could be checking into the Galactic Suite Hotel in just five years.
Bosses behind the space tourism company are due to start taking bookings next year for the holiday that will include an 18-week astronaut training stay on an idyllic Caribbean island.
Orbit
Galactic Suite director Xavier Claramunt says: “This is the first package deal to space. It includes transport to the Caribbean island, the training required for journeys into orbit, the flight to the hotel and three nights in space.”
The journey will have more unique attractions than the, er, lack of atmosphere.
Space-hotel guests will be able to see the sun rise and set 18 times a day. Even Jules Verne’s fevered imagination couldn’t have competed VIEW TO A THRILL … how guests will look down on Earth while relaxing against the Velero wall of the pod with the speed at which the hotel will whizz around the world – once every 80 minutes.
The hotel will initially cater for just six guests in three pod-shaped rooms. But the aim is to eventually feature up to 20 pods built around a central nucleus.
The pods, 23ft long and 13ft high, will have almost no furniture – there won’t be much call for the old trouser press in zero gravity.
Guests will wear Velero suits, allowing them to anchor themselves to walls when they want a break from floating.
The Barcelona-based architects responsible for designing the hotel say some of their biggest challenges have been in designing bathrooms.
Xavier explains: “How to accommodate the more intimate activities of the guests has not been easy. The toilet is still a challenge.”
But designers have solved the problem of washing in space – guests will enter a spa room filled with floating bubbles of water.
Worrying about the return trip also won’t be a problem – the shuttle that takes guests into space will remain docked with the pods, ready to take them back to earth.
Backed
Xavier says: “There is fear associated with going into space.”
“That’s why the rocket will remain fixed to the space hotel, so guests know they can get home again.”
The £1.5billion privately funded project is being backed by a variety of aerospace companies and one mega-rich, un-named individual. Xavier adds: “We have calculated that there are 40,000 people in the world who could afford to stay at the hotel. Whether they would want to spend money on going into space, we just don’t know.”
COMING back to earth with a bang, Travelodge today reveal a pod of a very different kind.
The TravelPod is the world’s first mobile hotel room, ideal for stays at festivals and events.
The 21ft-long pod has a double bed, a TV and DVD, tea and coffee-making facilities and a washroom with basin and toilet.
It will be tested over the next couple of months.
The public will have the opportunity to participate in trials by entering a prize draw at travelodge.co.uk.