Wilson da Silva and a very jealous Russell Woolf

One lucky Australian's childhood dream is about to come true - he will be blasting off into space as one of the world's first space tourists.

Wilson da Silva, the editor of COSMOS science magazine, has a ticket booked on the special flight in 2008 and he spoke to a very jealous Russell Woolf on his Drive program.

His spaceship will be a specially built plane that will carry a rocket, once the plane reaches a height of 17 km (the average jumbo goes to 10km) it will drop the rocket, the engines are turned on and then it will take off at 3 times the speed of sound, straight up into space.

Da Silva never imagined that he would be one of the first 100 people in the world to take the commercial flight but it is all thanks to a very generous colleague.

Alan Finkel, the co-founder of COSMOS Magazine, bought a ticket for himself and then gave Wilson a ring and said, "Hey Wilson, do you want to also go?" and when he said he couldn't really afford it Alan Finkel then added, "Hey what if I pick up the tab?"

And the price for a ticket? US$200,000 - da Silva never imagined he would be the proud owner of such a boarding pass.

"I kind of like the idea of being amongst the first," he told Russell. "This is the door opening to sub-orbital flights - the kind of stuff that would see people flying Sydney to London in 3 hours."

He will get to see the curvature of the earth and is looking forward to spending 14 minutes of the journey in zero gravity.

The whole journey will only last 3 hours but Wilson thinks it will probably be his best.

Listen to the interview in RealMedia format; duration 10:30 minutes (requires RealPlayer).