The Beauty of Space Tourism

Some of you may have seen these images floating around the internet, but for those of you who haven’t, I felt that they were worth showing, partly because I have always been and will always be a bit of a space geek, and partly because I love the retro-futuristic images that seem to embody a “golden age” of travel that never was.

The power of the stars has gripped man from our earliest ancestors on. We’ve looked to the sky for hints about the future, we’ve passed down constellations and the lore of monsters and heroes, we’ve staked national pride on our ability to leave behind the pull of the earth. The cosmos is at once mesmerizing and terrifying.

What else can make us feel quite as small? The earth is our home, our gift, our inheritance, and the estate we leave our children. And in this first life, whose chapter only ends and opens to the next with death, the earth is also our body’s grave. In that respect, our desire to reach out into the heavens is in part our soul’s cry for immortality.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of…

High Flight – John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Maybe it’s our childlike imagination, maybe it’s our need to leave our mark and step into the pantheon of our own constellations. Whatever the motivation, our eyes are constantly drawn to the stars.

For the full list, check out the origional set here.