Interesting news about possible commercial trips around the moon, coming soon to you for $100,000,000. That's a lot of money for a holiday that offers the potential danger of death from solar flare.
But then again, maybe if the spacecraft is thickened up a bit from the average density of the old Apollo craft, maybe death is avoidable. This interesting article (from NASA, so maybe it is more optimistic than it should be) indicates that the Apollo command module would have given a fair degree of shielding. Maybe the real concern during Apollo was for the astronauts if they were caught on the moon during a flare. I am sure the Lunar Module would have offered pretty pitiful shielding, as there was not much to it.
I also found this nice little site about the possible replacements for the Shuttle. The little rocket based on the shuttle solid rocket booster looks very neat, and I don't think even I would have much worry about riding a solid rocket. From what I gather, they are pretty damn simple devices, and don't tend to blow up. Unfortunately, looks like you still need a liquid fueled second stage too. D'oh...
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