Distance Covered: 1,999 lys

Visited Systems: 29

Highlights: Anemones and Vents, Ringed Water Moon, Triple Water Worlds

I woke up in a field of Rubeum Bioluminescent Anemones. Actually I just knew it was Anemones, because of yesterdays ship's scanner malfunction. My first task then was to deploy the SRV and go for a quick drive even though it was still dark. But the darkness allowed me to enjoy the luminescence effect much better than in broad daylight. Fortunately the SRV scanner worked without a problem and I could confirm the find for the Codex. As it is common there were also geological signals present, in this case I found Sulphur Dioxide Gas Vents, which I scanned as well.

The rest of the day held little surprises in terms of discoveries except for a Water World, which not only was in the moon position (orbiting a ringed class III giant) but also had rings of its own. And quite beautiful ones, too. In fact it was the only moon the gas giant had. And a bit later on I found a system with three terraformable Water Worlds, not too rare but still a nice first discovery.

Distance Covered: 3,357 lys

Visited Systems: 66

Highlights: The Impossible, Anemones

When something is called The Impossible (Eok Flyuae AQ-P e5-2798) you do except it to be rather extraodinary and I did not get disappointed. Let me quote from the EDSM PoI text, because it describes it very succinctly: "The Impossible is an Earth-like World 1.8 times the size of our own. The planet itself orbits a Black Hole and a White Dwarf only 23 ls away. The Black Hole and White Dwarf are only 4 ls apart. The probability of this occurring is incredibly low and would be considered a very rare find in the galaxy." It is only too bad there is no landable body nearby to soak in this scene, but even from the ship it is a mind-boggling sight. I took quite a few pictures.

But where to go from here? My eventual target were the Conflux Abandoned Settlements, which I had skipped on my way to Colonia. But these were nine and a half thousand lightyears away. Alternatively I could go to Gagarin Gate, only about 5,500 lys distance. There I could take a break and then continue on. Or should I head to Eudaemon Anchorage (11,100 lys), overshoot the Settlements and then backtrack roughly fifteen hundred lightyears? But backtracking didn't sound to enticing, especially since it was a well used path. In the end I realised that I had gotten used to those kind of distances and to travel for longer times without needing a break (less so than my ship perhaps). And since Gagarin Gate was a bit too much out of my way for my taste I selected the Settlements and set off.

After about another 20 jumps it was late enough to stop for the night, but not before I landed on a planet with biological signals. From my window I could only see that it was some kind of anemones, strangely enough my scanner couldn't pick up a signal. I decided to wait till tomorrow and check things out with the SRV, perhaps we would even rotate into the light (it was dark when I landed).

Distance Covered: 2,738 lys

Visited Systems: 47

Highlights: None

No highlights today except for the odd Water World and a "warm" Jovian with vertical rings (took some nice photographs). I made good progress though towards my next target, which I could reach late evening depending what I find along the way.

Distance Covered: 1,095 lys

Visited Systems: 19

Highlights: The Great Annihilator, Black in Green Tourist Installation

The Great Annihilator Black Hole (Great Annihilator) is the biggest known black hole in the galaxy apart from Sag A* (which is special being the center of the galaxy). As such it is impressive with roughly 200,000 solar masses and definitely worth a visit. Except, when you've just seen Sag A* three days before, the whole experience lacks in novelty! But I wanted it to see anyways. The system itself has a second black hole with 66 solar masses (so quite big as well) and both are orbited by T-Tauri stars (five in total). And even a single planet, 25,000 ls off, manages to circle about the big one.

What a contrasting experience the Black in Green Tourist Installation (Shrogea MH-V e2-1763) offers. Although the system contains only a black hole of the regular size (2.5 solar masses), it is situated in a green planetary nebula creating an eerie but beautiful setting. There is also a Tourist Installation (as the name implies), unfortunately it is not accessible for the general public, only for chartered tourist ships. I took quite a few pictures from the whole area.

My next stop is now about four and a half thousand lightyears southwest, named The Impossible. Before we find out what it means, two or three days of travel need to be done, because the navigation computer calculated that to be about 90 jumps. Let's see what we discover enroute.

Distance Covered: 2,501 lys

Visited Systems: 45

Highlights: Meridian Crossing, Arissa's Orbs, 1 Earth-like World

The next stop was to offer two points of interest very close to each other. I aimed for Arissa's Orbs (Athaip GW-M c23-2801) first, but The Great Annihilator Black Hole is only a few jumps away. The orbs are a very close binary of Earth-like Worlds. Always a mesmerizing sight. On the way there I discovered another Earth-like World myself, accompanied by a couple of Water Worlds.

The discovery was actually quite accidental, because just before I had changed my direct course towards the orbs. When checking the galaxy map I noticed that I would both cross the galactic plane and the north-south meridian which emanates from Sol (which has by definition the coordinates of 0,0,0). I thought I'll try to pick the closest star to that crossing point and ended up at a planetless system with a K-class arrival star and three independent M-class companions (i.e. no common barycenter) at the galactic coordinates of -1 / 0.21875 / 23489.5 or in commonon langage pretty much exactly 23,490 lys north of Sol.

After having scanned the orbs I did a few more jumps towards the Annihilator, but it was getting to late, so it will have to wait until tomorrow.

Editorial Note: I've changed the distance reporting from Total to Daily starting this log entry. Totals will be presented at the end of the journey.

Distance Covered in Total: 27,221 lys

Visited Systems Today: 37

Highlights Today: Ring of Fire, Roseum Sinuous Tubers, Ammonia Worlds, Y-Dwarf with vertical rings

The Ring of Fire (Zunuae IU-D d13-363) is a tourist point at the second gas giant orbiting an MS-class arrival star. Because of its high axial tilt the rings provide an unusual perspective in combination with the background and the star. Fortunately no interruptions at the beacon, only a few tourist ships were there.

Before I got there though I found a system with biological signals and discovered my first Roseum Sinuous Tubers on a moon with a very close orbit to its planet. You can't help but have the feeling that this huge ball is falling on your head any time soon. Still I took the time for a proper landing and also visited some of the Silicate Vapour Gas Vents, which also could be found here.

The rest of the day brought a few Ammonia Worlds (one of them being a moon) and a little surprise. I discovered my own vertical ring setting. A Y-Dwarf orbiting a Class A star at a distance of about 20 ls. Took some great pictures there.

Distance Covered in Total: 25,219 lys

Visited Systems Today: 18

Highlights Today: Explorer's Anchorage, Sagittarius A*

What a welcome sight Explorer's Anchorage (Stuemeae FG-Y d7561) was. Although I have now been almost two months on my exploration trip, the last 15 days were the longest between stations. Still this is nothing compared to the great expeditions that take months, sometimes even a year. On the other side each time I reach a station I am quickly at the point where nothing holds me there. Sure, repairs are needed, stuff needs to be restocked and a paintjob refresh is nice, too. But once that is done a deep space station offers few distractions. Which means I soon set off to finally see Sag A* and instead of coming back (as originally intended) I would continue on from there.

When I arrived at Sag A* I was shocked (in a positive way). I went there with the idea that it is a black hole, just bigger. I mean, by now, I have seen quite a few black holes and this one was just going to be bigger. But when you finally see it, you realise that this is something completely different in scale, one of a kind and nothing can you prepare for it. It is very, very impressive. Did I say yet that it is big? To get to the tourist point you actually have to fly a curve around it, because it does in fact encompass so much space quite unlike any other black hole I encountered. Of course, those usually just had two to six solar masses, Sag A* has 516,608 solar masses!

I spent an hour there, together with plenty of tourist ships, and made tons of photographs. There is in fact another star in the system, some 100,000 ls away, a class-B star called Source 2, but nothing else. So I finally reached the point where I had to leave.

With that realisation I punched in my next target and started my journey back home to Shinrarta Dehzra. Visiting a few POIs along the way my first milestone will be Gagarin Gate. From there I wanted to set out and inspect the Conflux Abandoned Settlements. That should prove rather interesting and would pose a different kind of exploration compared to what I have done up till now. And then back to the bubble and probably a longer rest. After that who knows. Maybe meet up with some other explorers and do a real expedition. Real big and real long. We'll see.

Distance Covered in Total: 24,476 lys

Visited Systems Today: 34

Highlights Today: None

I didn't quite make it to Explorer's Anchorage this day. I got off to a late start and then there were so many planets in each system which needed scanning. But except for the odd Water World there was not much to be excited about. No matter, I will get there today and after repairs I'll probably start off to a day trip to Sag A*.

Distance Covered in Total: 22,921 lys

Visited Systems Today: 30

Highlights Today: 1 Earth-like World, 1 Ammonia World, Ivan Almar's Dream

Well, no black holes today. But on my way to Ivan Almar's Dream (Dryao Chrea WU-X e1-2129) I encountered a system which had both an Earth-like and Ammonia World. The POI itself is known for its twin Earth-likes orbiting an M-class star which in turn orbits a Neutron Star (arrival point).

This is about as far north as I wanted to go on this journey. I am now heading south towards Explorer's Anchorage for a quick stop-over before I finally visit Sag A*.

Distance Covered in Total: 20,921 lys

Visited Systems Today: 54

Highlights Today: Black Holes (lots), Herbig Star, Water Moon

As mentioned yesterday my navigation computer was not able to plot a route to Ivan Almar's Dream and I had to pick a manual target some distance closer to me. When I picked that waypoint manually I selected a Black Hole which somehow caught my eye. Little did I know what was going to happen. Once I arrived at the location and everything was scanned I called up the galaxy map again and it still was in Realistic Mode. Which shows Black Holes as little black balls (go figure ;-), which are actually quite easy to spot since I am in the Galactic Core sector meaning a very bright background (like raisins in bread). In fact I had already spotted a second one close by when searching for a waypoint so I looked for it again as my next target. Then I saw it, but then I saw another one and ... another one. In fact they seemed to be everywhere and only very short distances away! The shortest jump from one hole to another was a mere 9.3 lys and many were in the tens and twenties of lightyears distance. In the end I scanned 25 systems having black holes as arrival stars and for each one I visited there were at least two or three others close by which I skipped.

Now I have heard of Wepaa Stellar Graveyard or Black Pearls Basket, which are similar conglomerations of black holes, but this is the first time I am actually in such an areas and it is mind boggling. A normally rare thing and then so many in one place (astronomically speaking). And apperantly completly unknown to the World. Only one black hole was visited before, all others were first discoveries. In any case, the whole section deserves a closer investigation, something that must be done on a separate trip since I am not really prepared to spend the needed time for that right now.

Finally I decided to continue again towards my original goal for today, except I would reach it only tomorrow. Two more highlights though before I stopped for the night: A Herbig Star (discovered in the middle of the black hole frenzy) and a Water World orbiting a T-Tauri star orbiting a B-class star. Not your typical moon, but still.