Japan billionaire grateful for Earth after space trip

"When you go into space, you become obsessed with Earth," he told reporters during a news conference in Tokyo on Friday. "You're grateful that it has wind, that it has smells, that it has seasons."

The 46-year-old fashion magnate and art collector in December became the first space tourist on the International Space Station in over a decade, preparation for a more ambitious trip around the moon with Elon Musk's SpaceX planned for 2023.

Even with his fresh return from space, Maezawa is already bubbling with new plans.

"Not just the moon, next time not just the sky, I want to go down as well," he said. "I'm looking into a trip to the Mariana Trench. That's a challenge I am considering now, and there are a lot of other things I would like to continue in the future."