Leaving Omega Mines and waving Good-Bye to this potato base (asteroid bases in their hollowed out blocks of rock remind people on a potato shape) I jumped through the last 12 systems for today’s journey. Arriving at the Shadow Head docking at 19:29hrs I found 287 Tons of Tritium left in her Tritium Depot so I issued orders to replenish that depot. We will progress further on this journey.

Distance to Shadow Head: 5177,10ly

Distance to Omega Mining: 5493,30ly

I am aiming for Byua EUQ BR-D c12-18 as a finishing point for this northern route, which is located South of Shadow head and East of the Omega Nebula. To reach this system I need to do 86 jumps plus 12 jumps to reach Omega Mining.

Remark: Turned out all passed systems were unknown and the first mapped system occurred six jumps out of Omega Sector VE-Q b5-15, which is the home system of Omega Mining.

It seems all areas south of the line from Omega Mining towards the Hawking’s Gap Settlements so far are scarcely visited or crossed by commanders. The few visited systems I saw during the last hours on the southern line of my route seemed to have been cross points of this line with the lines connecting Hawking’s Gap Settlements with places located inside the bubble. Seems as well this area is offering some opportunity to discover unknown worlds not too far from the bubble space.

I am curious to see Omega Mining again and to have a short stroll through the interior of this asteroid base. I was busy during the community goal at Omega Mining during Distant Worlds II expedition 3 years ago. I still keep the Mining Python I used them days inside the asteroid base; I might have the opportunity to give “Der Pott” some engineer upgrades but I will leave her there.

Only one or two systems had discovered bodies on the east-western route, today. All other systems on this northern bound route through the Hawking’s Gap and towards today’s North-Eastern turning point seem to be undiscovered at all.

Byoi EUR 00-Y d1-9; 13:37hrs: Today’s north-western turning point in south-western Hawking’s Gap is reached. This system is rich, containing 56 planetary and solar bodies in total (excluding asteroid belts). This system also contains a ringed Water Giant as well as a much smaller Water World.

10:55hrs: Outer Orion Spur was entered.

11:09hrs: WP 80 located in the Outer Orion Spur is reached, the next jump-point will be straight to the North, the first jump on the northern line of 39 jumps to the north-eastern turning point in Hawking’s Gap, which is Byoi EUR 00-Y d1-9.

11:24hrs: Byoi Thae MZ-F d11-9; this system does count 58 planetary and solar bodies (excluding the asteroid belts of course).

11:35hrs: Entering Hawking’s Gap at Byoi Thae UE-A c29-2, finding 3 Water Worlds.

12:08hrs: Dinner on the surface of an unknown moon.

Apart from one Water World I found some remarkable space phenomena: Rubeum Metal Crystals, coloured red and Prasinum Metal Crystals, which appear to have a green colour.

I discovered one Water World, one Earth-Like Water World and five metallic rich worlds.

As expected: while progressing further East on the southern route, most found planetary bodies turned out to be undiscovered. The scanned objects include a few Water Worlds and Earth-Like Water Worlds, which are different from Earth-Like Worlds (the latter do have visible landmasses and or continents). I am halfway towards the South-Eastern WP inside Outer Orion Spur, which will be the turning point to the North connecting to the northbound route through Outer Orion Spur and western Hawking’s Gap.

Most pilots navigate towards specific targets or POIs (points of interest). As a result inside this area of the galaxy most probable courses connect locations in the bubble with the centre, some vary due to deviations to some of the Guardian Sites or settlements on the way North. Plenty of routes pilots choose may lead into the opposite direction towards Colonia or Omega Mining or Rohini, which could be a useful part of any route directly to the colonies. The most common routes from the bubble towards the Hawking’s Gap Settlements are north from my recent location as well as all paths from or to the Hawking’s Gap Settlements and Omega Sector.

While I was going East I frequently issued jump orders for the Shadow Head (Q5N-55M), which is following her given waypoints further North on a course passing Omega Mining approximately 500ly East of the Omega Nebula. So far, it would be very easy to alter her course towards the colonies due to the fact Shadow Head's recent course deviates just one or two degrees from a line between Eleumo and Omega Mining and approximately 7 to 10 degrees from her original route to Colonia she followed in 3306. Of course, this is a new exploration project, so there will be no course alterations.

The first ten of the 80 jumps on the southernmost navigation line were done. So far less than 10% of the stellar objects and bodies were undiscovered or unknown. This equals the rate of unknown to known systems I found during my visit of the Red Spider Sector last night.

Approximately 3kly North of the bubble and slightly Eastward of the line connecting system Smojue XB-B c27-3 with Eleumo.

The Shadow Head started in Eleumo and was parked in Smojue XB-B c27-3 until a few minutes ago. Yesterday I visited a few systems in Red Spider Sector while Shadow Head was progressing on her course, finally waiting in this system. The Shadow Head follows a route towards Buya Aim HC-M d67-2196, a system I saw first in late 3305 on a return voyage from the colonies and again in 3306 during DW2.

For today’s route, I imagined an exploration route drawing a simple box: one line to the East, one line to the North and one line to the West, eventually leading to Omega Mines at the edge of Omega Nebula.

Using my oldest ship Honest Tuck, an AspX, I am following a line straight eastward while climbing ‘up’ from under the Galactic Plain: 80 waypoints (WP) towards Byoi Thae BS-R b34-0, which will be the South-Eastern corner of the virtual box the navigation lines will form on the Galactic Map. This WP will be located in the (north-) western-most corner of Outer Orion Spur. Following this line, this catena, I will cross the western part of the Inner Orion Spur before crossing the imaginary frontier line into the south-western region of the Outer Orion Spur. The first turning point of the four corners of the virtual box of lines will be located in the Outer Orion Spur, the second turning point, the North-Eastern one, lays inside the Western region of the Hawking’s Gap and the temporary endpoint should be Omega Mining west of the Omega Nebula.