The skies are different shades of red while my space pod narrowly avoids a larger flying vehicle above. A gold monument adorns a large white plaza where thousands of humans are walking around. A welcome message from the United Government of Mars greets me. I've arrived in the City of Wisdom and it's the year 2117, a century on from now, and it was very much like a scene from "Star Wars". The virtual reality (VR) experience comes to an end, but my journey through the Red Planet showed the ambitions of countries like the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and entrepreneurs such as SpaceX founder Elon Musk. The Mars 2117 experience was on display at the World Government Summit in Dubai this weekend and highlighted the government's hopes of space travel.

Visitors try out the Mars 2117 virtual reality experience at the World Government Summit in Dubai on February 2, 2017. Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

"The city is roughly the size of Chicago. It has a population of 600,000," Saeed Al Gergawi, manager of the scientific and research committee of the World Government Summit, told CNBC in an interview on Monday. "We came up with that number because it's like someone going to an exotic island, not everyone can go first, then we get advancement of rocket tech, which makes people move there easily, then the advancement of oxygen tech to make it more earth like, which would incentivize people." Travel to Mars has been a hot topic in recent times with Tesla boss Musk outlining plans in September to colonize the Red Planet and send people there within the next decade. The idea is to slowly build up sustainable living conditions to eventually have hundreds of thousands of people on the planet in a self-sustaining community.