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Millionaire space traveler enjoyed trip

He left his camera behind and the accommodation was smaller than expected, but Gregory Olsen said Thursday his excursion was still worth every bit of the $20 million he reportedly paid - after all, it was in outer space.

It was everything I had expected," Olsen, a U.S. scientist and businessman, told The Associated Press two days after returning to Earth from the international space station aboard a Russian Soyuz capsule. Olsen is the third private citizen to make a paid trip into space.

"I enjoyed the feeling weightlessness, just floating around and seeing the outside world," he said. But the enjoyment may have distracted him from keeping track of his personal belongings - he admitted that a small digital camera floated out of his jumpsuit pocket and went missing.

During his training, a medical problem cropped up that forced his trip to be postponed, but to his relief he later got the go-ahead. "The biggest thing I was nervous about was not being able to go. You know, it's a fear we all have: 'Here's the test, I'd better not fail it.'"

Olsen returned with Russian Sergei Krikalev and American John Phillips, who had been aboard the station six months. They were replaced on the ISS by William McArthur and Valery Tokarev, who were with Olsen when he blasted off for the station on Oct. 1.

Resource: AP Wire

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