Living on the moon will be a delightful experience, according to one of the last two men to walk on the lunar surface. But watch out for the dust - it gets into everything.
Astronaut Harrison Schmitt flew on the Apollo 17 mission to the moon in December 1972, and was the second-last person to set foot on the lunar surface.
He said he was excited about the prospect of a return to the moon in the coming years, and was unequivocal about his own experience. "It was delightful," he told a session of the American Association for the Advancement of Science over the weekend. "The explorers who arrive there are going to have a delightful time."
He likened movement on the surface to cross-country skiing or walking on a trampoline. "It is like going across a great trampoline without edges. The moon only has one-sixth of our gravity and even with the heavy suit and backpack I only weighed the equivalent of 61 pounds."
The very fine, persistent lunar dust was a problem, however, coating everything and tracking back into the spacecraft. "We experienced it for three days; it is annoying and we learned from that experience that we don't want to do it again."
He was of the view that private-sector funding should be used when colonising the moon. He said investors could help fund the venture and then reap the rewards of their investment, while also helping to sustain the scientific goals of the mission.
President George Bush has committed the US to a human return to the moon by 2020 and research efforts are already under way to ensure this happens. "We are also in discussion on what we do when we get to the moon," said Dr Simon Worden, director of Nasa's Ames Research Centre.
The panel argued that it was important to return to the moon and attempt to set up permanent settlements there. It could be of economic benefit through retrieving resources from the lunar soil, but it would also be valuable on a scientific front.
"I am excited about the opportunities for science," Dr Worden said. "Looking at what the moon could do for astronomy is very, very exciting."
It was essential that any settlement placed there should understand how to derive necessary resources from the moon, said Dr G Jeffrey Taylor of the Hawaii Institute of Geophysics and Planetology in Honolulu.
"The goal of the programme should be a permanent presence, a settlement on the moon," he told the meeting. "We have to use the resources on the moon to be self-sustaining." The lunar surface could supply life-support and building materials, he said.
We need to travel to the moon, if only to learn how to travel further to Mars, said Dr Wendell Mendell of Nasa's Johnson Space Centre in Houston. It was about "living and working on other worlds", he suggested. "We should use the moon to learn how to live and work on Mars."