Richard Branson envisions 'sexy hotels' in space

Imagine waking up in a little spaceship orbiting around the moon, spending the day hanging out there and then going back to your fancy hotel pod in space for the evening.

Just a daydream? The subject of a sci-fi novel?

Not according to Richard Branson, the British entrepreneur and founder of Virgin Galactic, who envisions a future where private citizens can fly to space as well as professional astronauts.

In a Facebook Live interview with Branson, Mashable asked him what his ultimate dream is for humanity in space, in a hundred years' time.

"I'd like to have really sexy Virgin hotels in space where people can go and stay in pods, head off in little spaceships around the moon, where they wake up in the morning and then they go back to their pods in the evening," he said.

Branson, 66, also said he'd like to get everyone connected in the world "because if you're not connected you're held back massively."

"I'd like Virgin Galactic to be involved in deep space exploration," he added. "Stephen Hawking, who's going to go to space with Virgin Galactic one day, wants us to colonise other colonies because, if a disaster happens to earth, he doesn't want to see evolution wasted."

"In 100 years' time I suspect we would've colonised somewhere like Mars," Branson added.

Hawking does have a ticket to fly to suborbital space aboard the Branson-backed Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo when it does start flying customers. (Hawking is the only customer that didn't have to pay for a SpaceShipTwo ticket, which usually costs about $250,000.)

In a book published by The Guardian, Hawking contends that humans need to venture deep into space for the sake of adventure and the survival of our species.

Virgin Galactic has started test flights of its space plane, but it's unclear when tourists will fly onboard the vehicle.

A fatal accident during a test flight in 2014 destroyed Virgin Galactic's first SpaceShipTwo, greatly setting back the company's progress on the spaceflight system.

The new SpaceShipTwo was named Unity by Hawking, who said, "I would be very proud to fly on this spaceship," when the craft was unveiled in February 2016. 

Branson said space escalation is important because connectivity without space "just wouldn't exist."

"It's important we get many people to go to space so they can see how fragile our beautiful earth is and hopefully when they come back they can take after it," he said.

Branson is not the only billionaire with that vision.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk has said that he wants to make sure the human race is safe from an extinction-level event (like an asteroid strike) on Earth by establishing a city on Mars. He recently presented his vision for a future society on Mars to the world during a speech at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico.