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I don't want to really fly there, it would take too long and probably would be prohibitively expensive for me.

But nevertheless I am really wondering if it is already possible, and if so, how expensive it is and which companies might offer such ventures?

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  • 5
    Not yet but I believe you can make bookings!
    – hippietrail
    Sep 16, 2011 at 8:20
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    @hippitrail: "Yeah; we don't have a working spaceship yet, but we already figured out how and how much to bill you for the flight." :)
    – iHaveacomputer
    Sep 16, 2011 at 11:08
  • 3
    I personally think there wasn't a single moon landing ever.
    – RoflcoptrException
    Sep 16, 2011 at 12:45
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    There wasn't a single moon landing -- there were several. Also Mars, but those didn't have people on board.
    – xpda
    Sep 16, 2011 at 15:38
  • 6
    I love the tags on this one: long-haul & remote-locations :)
    – Tschareck
    Aug 15, 2012 at 7:35

6 Answers 6

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  1. Currently the only variant to visit the cosmos is to go to the International Space Station
  2. The only way to visit the ISS is to go there aboard a Russian Soyuz (spacecraft). Note: you must go through some training before this.
  3. The price is up to $40 000 000 (and $15 000 000 more to go to open space).
  4. In the near future the Russian company RosCosmos is going to provide tours around the Moon, but it is still a project, not a real tour perspective.
  5. Other tours are all about near-Earth flights.

Update

Space Adventures announced the first commercial flight to the Moon in 2017 (50 years from Appolo 1 flight), the price is $300.000.000 for two places. Flight will be done via russian Soyuz.

Good luck!

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    Just want to point out that in the past 40 years several companies have promised to provide tours "around the moon" and all of them have been happy to take your money... none have done it.
    – Beaker
    Sep 16, 2011 at 12:43
  • @Ginamin This company got some contracts, so we will see :) And they aren't sell anything yet.
    – VMAtm
    Sep 16, 2011 at 12:45
  • fair enough :), it's just something to watch out for.
    – Beaker
    Sep 19, 2011 at 1:08
  • That might be the most expensive tourist ticket ever offered.
    – gerrit
    Nov 16, 2012 at 23:24
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    As of 2021 the 2018 revised flight hasn't happened.
    – DJClayworth
    Feb 6, 2021 at 22:30
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Unfortunately since 1972, travel to the moon has been non-existent, tourism or business. Currently the best bets to get yourself to the moon are with the USA, the European Space Agency and China - all have serious space programs with intentions to return, but are in no hurry - indeed the European Space Agency prefers robotic missions in general.

NASA was targeting their next trip for 2018, but that now looks to be perhaps a decade later than that. China is aiming for 2024, and India is perhaps dreaming but claims to want to go in 2020. Naturally places are limited on these crafts so you'll want to get in early.

Prices are difficult to estimate. Space tourism to the International Space Station is generally on the Soyuz rockets which can only reach Low Earth Orbit, and trips are generally believed to be around US$20 million per person.

If you're content with just a look at the moon, the private company Space Adventures and the Russian Space Agency have floated the idea of a flight around the moon for around US$100 million.

Getting around is more difficult once there, you can't fly as there's no atmosphere, and unless you bring a rover/vehicle you're stuck walking. If you can manage to land on Mons Hadley, the Descartes Highland or the Taurus-Littrow valley there are three stranded moon buggies from previous trips that may have some power left in them for your purposes.

There's not much to do once there - but the view of Earth is outstanding. You can play golf - although there's no official courses, but with the low gravity you'll set a personal best for driving, I promise!

And of course, where better a place to do the moonwalk than on the Sea of Tranquillity, site of the original manned moon landing!

Don't forget to bring food and drink with you, as there are currently no markets or shops on the surfaces, although Dominos is planning on opening a branch of its pizza chain there soon.

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Another more graphical answer:

Guide to going into Space

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With the privatisation of space travel business, there are some interesting projects in pipeline.
Check the below links:

  1. Virgin Galactic - Richard Branson's Virgin Group Venture
  2. Blue Origin - Jeff Bezos' (Amazon CEO) venture
  3. Space Elevator
  4. List of private spaceflight companies
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    This would be a better answer if it included a tiny amount of relevant information (cost? estimated date? where you would go eg earth orbit, moon etc) not just the links.
    – Kate Gregory
    Jan 14, 2012 at 20:28
  • agreed. all you've done is include links to companies. Heck, I could add a link to NASA, but it wouldn't be very useful without some information?
    – Mark Mayo
    Mar 18, 2012 at 23:15
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A company, Golden Spike, offers bookings for lunar tours in the next decade.

According to news articles, the fee is as low as $1.4 billion.

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Wikipedia has a page on that topic: Tourism on the Moon:

Space tourism companies which have announced they are pursuing lunar tourism include Space Adventures,[4] Excalibur Almaz,[4] Virgin Galactic[2] and SpaceX.[3]

The SpaceX project, dearMoon project, is one of the most likely projects to be successful in my opinion, but is not planned to take place before 2023.

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