Audley Travel boss Craig Burkinshaw (pictured below) will experience the trip of a lifetime when he boards a Virgin Galactic spaceship.
The Oxfordshire-based businessman, who heads up the specialist tour operator, has spent £100,000 to be one of the first space tourists.
He said: “It’s a lot of money but I want to be among the first. I’ve done skydiving many times and travelled all round the globe, but this is going to be fantastic. I want to see the Earth the way astronauts see it.”
Launch and landing points will be in New Mexico and the journey will last an estimated 150 minutes. On each trip there will be just six passengers and the spaceship will reach a height of 100km, just past the Earth’s atmosphere.