My way back to the Carrier offered me a wide variety of worthy planets lately. My visited systems offered me Water Worlds...

... Water Worlds...

... and even more Water Worlds...

... up to 3 Water Worlds in one system... So many Water Worlds... But there was the odd Earth in between, I could catch 3 Earths since changing back to Eco Mode...

This is the big advantage of travelling on this depth (Y = -2300 ly). You get less boring and bland M dwarves, but mostly A, F and G stars with those precious planets in their hold. Plus the odd B, or O, or exotic star in between...

And sometimes, you stumble across planets, where a landing is mandatory. Either because you found Sineous Tubers...

... or High G planets with volcanism/Bios. This planet has 3.95 g and these are Sulphur Dioxide Fumaroles and Vents. What you don't see: the rings of that planet:

I also got my 15,000th visited system (just two stars) and am about to finish up my first 500,000 lys overall travelling distance (2,600 lys to go). On to the next 500k!

The start of the Way Back has been done, the first few jumps are made. My way leads me into the middle of the Empyrean Straits - and right to the "western end" of the "Drought Area" around longitude 0 (and +/- 300-500 lys from that), where even Mass Codes G and H are made of Brown Dwarves, T Tauris and the like. I chose a Mass Code G "super-high mass" T dwarf to start Eco Moding from there...

The first Neutron Star on the way offered this dark Earth Like for the photo of the day:

This one might be the darkest of all 102 ELWs I've seen so far (not counting ELWs in inhabitated systems, such as Earth itself, Explorer's Anchorage, ...). But it is still beautiful...

The second part of that little area saw me scanning lots and lots of A and F stars in the Greae Phio area. And I finally happened to get the two missing "coloured" clouds:

Rubicundum Lagrange Cloud with Viride Reel Molluscs, Crystals and Spheres. Yep, this is actually a picture taken from the Herbig system I visited in the Eeshorks Nebula - it is the one in the Codex FYI:

And the final Coloured one. The Luteolum Lagrange Cloud (with Crystals, and the Luteolum Reel Molluscs)

Then I wanted to do the Proto Lagrange Cloud too. Decided to play it safe and go to the system mentioned in the Codex. Result was: The system has indeed two Lagrange Clouds, both of them being Croceum clouds. No Proto clouds found. Same for every one of the surrounding systems. Caeruleum and Viride Clouds all over the shop, but no Proto cloud. Good evidence for the Codex being hella bugged...

Decided then to stop right there, and hand in the data to the nearby DSSA Void Crusaders. Where I'm docked now and will depart today, for the big Eco Mode tour back to my Carrier. Looking forward to it, as it will take place at around 2300 lys below the galactic plane, hoping for exciting systems along the journey...

Just a few days ago I reached the Greae Phio Nebula. Now it is time to completen the Phenomena category in the Codex. That means: Lagrange Clouds, Reel Molluscs, Crystals, ...

Most of the various kinds of the aforementioned objects are already checked in the Codex. More to come today - with a little detour to the Eeshorks Nebula - just for one type of Reel Molluscs (the Viride kind).

Here is a quick rundown of what is checked up so far:

Caeruleum Lagrange Cloud with Luteolum Reel Mollsucs, Flavum (not shown here) and Rubeum Metallic Crystals. It was pretty dark in there.

Luteolum Reel Molluscs bunched together inside a Croceum Lagrange Cloud (same system as the above Caeruleum Cloud)

I had a good laugh in the mean time, here is an example why. Look at the CMDR name:

Then a Herbig system. Featuring a Roseum Lagrange Cloud with both Solid and Lattice Mineral Spheres and again Luteolum Reel Molluscs (the little dots in between)

Here the Lattice variant, and I have to be honest: it was a first sight for me. Oh, here are some Molluscs in the background:

Don't get confused: These are Lindigoticum Reel Molluscs (and some Crystals and Spheres in another Caeruleum Cloud):

... and finally, a Viride Lagrange Cloud with a bunch of Solid Mineral Spheres and, again Lindigoticum Reel Molluscs (not shown here).

What is missing: Just three more Cloud types (Luteolum, Rubicundum, Proto) and the Viride Reels. Then I'll hop over to the nearby DSSA Void Crusaders, and plan my trip back to my MCFC Wuhu Island, trying to collect the 3 missing entries (Roseum Anemones, CO2 Gas Vents, Sulphur Dioxide Ice Fumaroles) on the way back (Eco Mode!!!)...

Byoi Aip CD-R c18-15 - MaultierColt308 has them: The four missing kinds of Sineous Tubers. He decided to play it safe and visit the planet which is noted down as the original finding spot in the ingame Codex.

And of course, they reside in the middle of the mountains. They are seen on the left, in the light bulb of the ships' lamps: Sineous Tubers - Viride, Lindigoticum, Violaceum (the dominant kind here) and Blatteum.

On the way to Greae Phio... There was a small blue blob popping up in the background. It was a planetary nebula, of course the system itself was already fully scanned (just a Neutron and a K star). From the directly neighboring system (Iockols UR-A b41-212, mostly undiscovered, 2.5 lys away), it looks like this:

And today, he maybe reaches the Greae Phio Nebula, or at least the closer proximity of it...

I intend to play safe for the missing Tuber kinds. That means: I'm going to the system mentioned in the ingame Codex (Byoi Aip CD-R c18-15), which is just 1k lys away from yesterday's Tuber spot.

Along the way, I found another two moons having the same Tubers as yesterday's spot - located in unlandable spots, which are very scenic for a change:

... a rare sight - a ringed Gas Giant only 40 ls away from its host star (an M dwarf):

... This dark massive Water World without atmosphere. How can the water stay liquid on such a planet???

.. and, as a takeaway, two further checks for my Codex! This time, it were the long lost Ammonia Ice Geysers and Fumaroles. The Ice Geysers are now complete!

And I change my plan: After surveying the Greae Phio area, I'll hand in my data to a nearby Carrier, descend to a depth of -2,500 ly, then Eco Mode my way back to my Carrier, hope for many exciting systems (especially mass code F, G, H) along the way and hand the data in...

Today it's just a short update... but I finally found Sineous Tubers in the Norma Arm. And now I really got to know that the in-game Codex is broken.

These are the "Blue" Sineous Tubers. Normally you would way: "Just one kind of them" (in this case, it would be Caeruleum) - my answer: No. It isn't. For some reason, every little difference in these Tubers makes a new kind of Tubers. What you can see when scanning them. Instead of "only Caeruleum", I found Caeruleum, Roseum, Prasinum and Albidum Tubers on that planet, each one of them being just a little different (in height and/or structure) from the others. The Albidum kind even was a First Discovery for the Norma Arm - although it already s on EDSM!? But the P10 anomalies don`t register here... What is going on here?

Nevertheless, one find along the way was this magnificent Earthlike right after leaving the area of the P10 anomalies. They are always worth the time and scan. This one orbits a G star, like our Earth :)

... or posing in front of a B class Super Giant in that area. Forget the Asps, Clippers should now be the ships in front of things:

I made it to my next destination. It were A stars in the sector Blu Ain, which offered me a variety of lifeforms to see. Four new Checks in my ingame Codex could also be made, so that I'll depart for the next destination today (only a short flight further). The hunt for these four lifekorms is now finished. It also marks pretty much the half-time point of the Norma Arm Codex Completion Spree:

Metallic Crystals - Flavum, Prasinum and Purpureum

The first picture shows the Flavum and Prasinum types, the second one the Purpureum type. I love the light on the latter ones!

... and some yellow light orbs... Anomalies Type P10 (which don't log on EDSM, for whatever reason...)

...rapidly taking down my shield:

...and I end off the day with some Rubeum Anemones. Today I'll move on...

The last few days were mostly just travelling. But yesterday, I was able to check off three more volcanism forms:

Not the very best picture, but these are Silica Vapour Ice Fumaroles:

Another spot on the same Rocky Ice Moon was pretty much unlandable - there were Silica Magma Spouts to find. Unlandable, but kinda scenic:

Some systems later, I came into an F star system. It had Terraformables, a Water World, and Gas Giants with mostly Icy moons. On one of these, I could check off a pretty rare form of ice volcanism - Nitrogen Ice Fumaroles and Geysers:

Only the Ammonia variant is now missing (as well as Carbon Dioxide Gas Vents and Sulphur Dioxide Ice Fumaroles). But I'm optimistic to check them off quickly too - even if they all are pretty rare. It is now time to concentrate on the "Biologic" (sector Iockols and/or Byoi Aip) and "Phenomena" (mostly found in the Greae Phio/Eeshorks area) categories...

Oh, and... these are Silica Vapour Gas Vents... in a pretty scenic spot. A nice night camp around an M dwarf along the way:

And this was seen just yesterday. A close-orbiting Binary HMC, orbiting 2 close-standing suns. Forming a little eclipse...

Today, it's time to travel on. My next destination is waiting, and there's a lifeform, which seemingly is not written into EDSM yet. Looking forward to it!

Part 3 of the Norma Arm Codex Completion leads us away from the Floalt Nebula. Next destination is a random system lying about 5,9klys away, so enough time to pick up the one or other Codex Entry along the way:

Silica Magma Spouts were found in the second system of yesterday:

And in the final system, I could scratch Water volcanism off my bucket list (no, not the "Icy" types). Here are Water Gas Venty, Fumaroles and Geysers. The moon is used as the actual night camp.

Big parts of the Geological Forms are done. Not many are missing!