Fun Destinations for space travel

My story is about astronauts returning to Earth after an extended voyage. They were traveling at near light speed, and while not much time has passed relative to them, it's been about a thousand years on Earth.

This calls to mind a number of questions: just what were they doing that was so important? Where were they going? etc. Questions which I am completely stuck on. I'd really appreciate some help.

So what is there that's about 1,000 years round-trip that's worth seeing? Keep in mind that 'near light' speed can be as close or as far from the speed of light as is convenient to the plot.

Uranus. Who WOULDN'T want to go there?

Joking aside, the most important space travel mission would probably be to the nearest inhabitable planet (which we've yet to find one in our galaxy). There are lots of factors that determine a planet's habitability such as having an atmosphere, getting enough heat and light from a *supernova*, having plants on it to conduct photosynthesis, and bearing the basic elements of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. I'm not an expert on this subject.

I'm not sure. Is the sun a supernova or am I thinking of something else?

edited 15th Jan '11 7:42:41 PM by colbertimposter

Well, how serious, humorous, hard or soft is the story? What is the tone?

For instance, for a soft comedy, I might suggest some planet of green skinned space babes, but for a more serious story, something like the above, a scientific mission.

Also, what are these people like? What side of the law are they on, etc? Are they law enforcers? Soldiers? Pirates? An interstellar drug run would be interesting, or on the other end of things, some religious mission or pilgrimage.

edited 15th Jan '11 8:53:19 PM by SPACETRAVEL

This is a cool website that might answer a few of your questions. It's an atlas of space!

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/250lys.html

Maybe telescopes showed what could be a Dyson Sphere, or other hints at the presence of aliens were discovered. Even moreso if they seem to be more technologically advanced than us, so we could learn from them. The mission's results don't have to be very important to the plot; Maybe there weren't any aliens there after all, or maybe they didn't leave much behind that is useful or informative. I think Freeman Dyson made some estimations of what a dyson sphere would look like from such distances.

And from the astronauts' perspective; Maybe they want to travel to the far future, where they hope immortality and prosperity (or maybe social changes) would be achived, and going on missions like this is the only way to do it.

edited 23rd Jan '11 1:05:46 PM by Yair-Jeger

You're free to visit Galaday...if you can find it.

I'm not sure. Is the sun a supernova or am I thinking of something else?

You're thinking of something else. The sun is a star. A supernova is when a star (orders of magnitude bigger than the sun) blows up in a humongous explosion which wipes out all life in the area. Supernovas are not something you want.

Supernovae are the largest known explosions in the universe. So powerful they can and do break the laws of physics.

edited 24th Jan '11 2:10:24 PM by MajorTom

Oh no they're not! [/pantomime]

edited 24th Jan '11 2:19:44 PM by Yej