So you never got a chance to fly on the Concorde?

You, me and most of the flying public.

In 27 years of passenger service, the mosquito-nosed aircraft made 50,000 flights and carried 2.5 million people, including one oil executive who averaged 70 transatlantic round trips a year. But unless your name was Paul McCartney, Luciano Pavarotti, Mick Jagger, Queen Elizabeth or Victoria Beckham, who flew Concorde to New York three times for wedding dress fittings, chances are your air transportation has been in cigar tubes with your knees up under your chin.

Alas, the supersonic transports were grounded permanently in 2003 due to falling revenues and rising maintenance costs.

The good news is that you can now take a trip on the Concorde for a lot less than the old one-way fare of seven or eight grand. How does $17.50 US sound?

That’s the adult admission - $12.50 for 12 and under - to Barbados Concorde Experience, the $3.5-million US retirement home of Alpha-Echo, one of the seven SSTs that were owned by British Airways and just 20 ever manufactured. Although the plane arrived on the island nearly four years ago, the 29,000-square-foot facility opened just this spring at Grantley Adams Airport.

Barbados, one of only four regular Concorde destinations, outbid more than 70 other countries to showcase the delta wing jet, which cruised at more than twice the speed of sound and at altitudes more than twice the height of Mount Everest. It took less than 312 hours to cross from London to New York, which meant, given the time difference, that Concorde effectively arrived before it left.

The Barbados Concorde Experience includes a virtual flight school, departure lounge, observation deck, inflight experience, multimedia presentation and, the star of the show, Alpha-Echo. It’s open every day from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Visitors receive a boarding pass at check in, go through “check in” and into the VIP lounge which simulates the real one at London’s Heathrow Airport. On board, they sit in the original leather seats to watch the video presentation, which includes sound effects of the Concorde taking off and breaking the sound barrier, and then tour the plane, including the cockpit.

Capt. Mike Bannister, the youngest pilot ever to fly the Concorde, has said that his most memorable experience was flying with the Royal Air Force Red Arrows acrobatic team over Buckingham Palace to salute the Queen. “Secondly, it was flying to Barbados for the very first time, and thirdly, flying the aircraft back ‘home’ to Barbados for the final time.”

The Barbados Tourism Investment agency plans to build a permanent aviation museum to replace the existing temporary hangar, whose construction was delayed by hurricane damage in 2004.

Visit barbadosconcorde.com or call 246-253-6257.