Segment 3 is done. And I am not.

Grim humour, yes, and there's a reason for it.

From my last stop at Traikoa IM-W e1-32 I planned my path to the border between the region 18 (Inner Orion Spur) and the region 9 (Inner Scutum-Centaurus Arm). Stellar density grows as I move towards the Galaxy center, so I managed to plot it using types O-A stars only. I think I have a soft spot for bright stars. It was another 153 jumps including a stopover at a neutron star, just to take a look and mark it in my Codex. And also I was doing some planetary landings to take a break and enjoy some views. That's where it went wrong...

It was a small icy moon of a gas giant that caught my attention by possibility of finding some carbon dioxide ice geysers on it. Nothing extraordinary, just to make a record in the Codex. Vanity, I might say. It was covered by deep canyons; ice crust stretched and creased by tidal force - not an easy landscape to land on, but it didn't bother me. The geological site I found was on the dark side, which made piloting more difficult. But the gravity was very low, and I thought it must be ok to land there. When you land on a high-g planet you expect troubles with keeping your speed at low level, and you take some care. Who'd think that low-g planets can be dangerous as well.

The surface appeared quite suddenly before my eyes, out of the dark. The first I saw was the hull integrity indicator dropping down to 50%. That was bad enough, but quite acceptable; I believe one can fly across half of the galaxy with 50%. I managed to drop my speed, made a maneuver, landed, took a a breath - and there was just 6% of the the hull integrity. Still have no idea how it happened, but that was the reality.

I found a small comfort in finding those carbon dioxide ice geysers (Codex record - checked, yay...), but now I had a real issue on my hands. I needed to decide if I continue my journey to the galaxy centre or turning back for repair. I still believed it's possible to reach the final destination point with just 6%, but it meant no planetary landings anymore. It would be too boring. On the other hand, it was almost 8000 l.y. to the Bubble. And I decided to finish the current segment first; another 200 l.y. won't make any difference.

Finally I stopped at Preae Aewsy GF-R d4-126, right on the edge of the sector, and now I have to make that decision. Going back and start it over or continue my route without any planetary landing? Not a choice I'd like to make. Are there other options?

Segment 2 is done.

178 jumps. Can't say I was travelling across a completely uncharted area; I encountered alreadyy discovered systems from time to time. But at least half of the system I visited were undiscovered. Found a lot if planets, Earth-like worlds included.

Stopped at Traikoa IM-W e1-32, the first Herbig star I found. It was a bit of disappointment, because this star is nothing special, though I know Herbig stars are rare. And it was already discovered by someone else.

From here my path lies to the edge of the region 18 (Inner Orion Spur). The journey continues.

Segment 1 is done.

I landed on several planets on my way to the edge of the Bubble gathering materials for FSD boosts and AFMU. Hopefully I won't need to use them, but it's better to be on the safe side. One of those planets was my first metal-rich body I landed on, an I was really surprised how many rare metals can be found there. On the other side, very basic non-metallic elements - carbon, phosphorous, sulfur - were scarce. Made a note to myself regarding that fact.

My last stop at a station was Talantas, a system where you can find a trader for raw materials. Some say those guys are bunch of crooks, but hey, what would you do otherwise when you need that darn arsenic, but all you've got is just some high grade stuff? Anyway, he saved me some time to fill my most important resources up.

The last thing I did on the station was selling all my exploration data. Data for 2 systems left unsold as being too close to Talantas, 318k Cr worth. I think it's nothing compared to what I can gather on my way to Sagittarius A*, so it's effectively zero.

After that I travelled about 1000 ly above the plane of the Galaxy until I stopped at Wregoe GJ-G C27-0. Saw a lots of unmapped planets on my way, up to 40 bodies in system sometimes, but almost all of them were of no interest to me. No one is interested in small icy worlds or even in high metal content worlds outside the Bubble. An explorer who decides to map them all should be highly dedicated to his cause... which is not my case. My aim is Sagittarius A*, and I continue my journey.

Finally, my exploration program for the Bubble is done. It was pretty short, to be fair, but still I visited 550 different systems and gathered about 180 million worth exploration data. More than enough to maintain my ship. And now I'm ready to start my trip to Sagittarius A*.

Ship: Cobra Explorer, quite standard setup, moderately engineered, jump distance 42 ly.

General plan: Reach Sagittarius A* without boosted jumps, in order to to keep it simple. Explore all first discovered systems. Map high-value planets in already discovered systems. Make personal Codex discoveries, if possible. Make this trip by segments, planning route between POIs or arbitrary chosen milestone systems.

And the foremost task: DIE NOT!

Everything is ready, and so am I. Well, almost everything, but these are small things that can be done while I'm crossing the Bubble. No reason to wait anymore.

Deep space, here I come.

... acquired!

Well, not literally, I'm free to fly anywhere. And still I can't leave the region...

During my previous trips I was putting marks on nearby stars for future exploration. Systems that looked promising or interesting enough, stars of a rare type etc. The plan was to map all the marked systems before going to Sag A*, plain and simple, so I thought. And it went fine until I found myself in a region with a bunch of blue stars. Class A mostly, with a few Bs. I decided to explore one of them or two... and now I can't stop. Their blue light changes everything around making my cabin and HUD look mysterious. They shine brightly even over the distant planets, creating some nice views. And surprisingly they have Earth-like words pretty often. One of them, Inti, has 4 Earth-like words, one of which is paired with a Water-world. What a system! And think it's not a super-rare feature, though a remarkable one. How in the world can I leave them unvisited...

And yes, I know that class A stars are white-blue rather than blue. But still, aren't they beautiful?

Oh my, LTT 2667 3 is something! Its rings have 31 hotspots for various resources. 31... I wonder why they haven't stripped it away yet, rock by rock.

Finally reached Felicia Farseer. Sold a bulk of exploration data and got several ranks in Exploration immediately. It seems to be easier than I thought. To my surprise I got a bonus for 14 planets being first mapped by me. That sounds like a whole system missed by everyone before me. Well, not totally missed, of course, I wasn't the first one to discover them. But still, it's a system on a busy road; everyone goes to Pleiades and back!

It's a shame that I didn't write that system's name down...

Meta-Alloys acquired, going back to meet Felicia Farseer. Plan to investigate some inhabited stars on my way, there might be some pricy planets.

Reached Merope, just 1 jump away from Maia, and that system has thargoid's footprints all over! Really!? I can swear, they were so rare in the old days... Do I really need to go to Maia to buy that Meta-Alloys?