Tito's vision: More civilians in space

Mayor Riordan, left, issues proclamation declaring "Astronaut Dennis Tito Day"

Adventurer wants poets, musicians in orbit

By CNN.com Senior Writer Linda Petty

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- The world's first paying space tourist Dennis Tito says now that he has "met my dream," his next goal is to help other civilians take a trip into space.

"What I would like to do is to put together a commercial venture that would provide much lower-cost transportation to orbit or sub-orbit for individuals who have the same desire that I do," he announced Wednesday after returning from Moscow.

The 60-year-old California financier returned to earth Sunday after an eight-day mission.

MESSAGE BOARD Human spaceflight

Tito reportedly paid Russian space agencies $20 million for his ride into space and visit to the international space station. But he said that it cost the American taxpayers about $70 million to send a single astronaut into space.

As he entered a room at the Los Angeles International Airport for a news conference with the theme music from the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey" playing over loudspeakers, Tito admitted that "I wish I was still up there."

Tito described the eight-day trip as an unbelievable experience and he wants more creative people to go into space so that more Americans can understand it.

"It would bring this into our culture. We've been in space as humans for 40 years and we don't have it in our music, we don't have it in our opera, our poetry in our literature," he said. "This is the space age."

The former NASA rocket scientist said there was no need for future space tourists to be engineers, but he suggested anyone who dreams of going into space should be in good physical shape to withstand the pressures during liftoff and landing.

But he said sleeping was a snap in zero-gravity and he got the best sleep of his life when he wasn't looking out the windows or taking pictures.

Tito also told reporters that despite NASA's anger about his trip, the U.S. astronauts were "very cordial to me. They were very professional and straight-laced."

He said he didn't see them much but he did help prepare their food.

On hand to greet Tito as he returned to Los Angeles was Mayor Richard Riordan, who declared Wednesday "Astronaut Dennis Tito Day" in the city.

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Glenn: Tito flight a 'misuse' of space station
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First space tourist returns to Earth
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Space tourist earns his keep
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