My next waypoint was Col 173 Sector KY-Q d5-47, via the Vela Pulsar.
The vela pulsar was a typical neutron star with multiple class V gas giants and a B class secondary star orbiting it.

My destination had 66 bodies, including a water giant.
My target here was some lindigoticum brain trees which are found on rocky/HMC worlds with temperatures between 300-500K according to the codex.
Only one planet matched this description: a ringed HMCW only 224Ls away. Two moons contained guardian signals and another contained both guardian signals and bio signs. Temperatures indicate that these bio signs are either roseum or gypseeum brain trees, likely the former.

I found the right variety of trees on the first attempt, I quite like this variety.

I decided not to visit the other sites in this system as there likely wasn't anything I hadn't already seen at them.

I visited HIP 38064 next. I saw my first ever ringed M class star here, I also saw a brown dwarf orbiting another brown dwarf.
I visited planet 2, which is inside the corona of the main B class star. The views were incredible, some of the best I've seen during my space travels.

Soon into my return journey from Eight Burst PN I encountered an interesting system; Plio Eurl BM-C d13-22. It had a star of type A9 VI, A9 is within the threshold where ELWs are most likely. It had no ELWs but it had 10 HMCWs, 7 of which were landable and 5 of which had silicate magma geo signs. It also had two nice looking gas giants with water based life, and a small water giant.

Found a rather oblate gas giant with ammonia life in Plio Eurl TK-E d12-20.

Got first discovery on all planets and moons in Plio Eurl NE-G d11-16,I believe these are the first undiscovered planets I've found during this trip. Most systems are fully discovered this close to the bubble.

The BD-17 3140 system at the centre of the Ghost of Jupiter PN was a wolf-rayet star orbited by two class V gas giants and a ringed metal rich body; there was also a single set of degraded emissions there when I got there.
The nebula itself is a type 5 (snowball) on my NVC system, same as the previous Eight Burst PN.

At the degraded emissions there was scrap, limpets, personal effects, and a black box. I retrieved the black box and two sets of personal effects from the debris, leaving the scrap and limpets behind. It appears there was either no survivors or the escape pods had already been retrieved. The only identifiable piece of wreckage was the cockpit section of a diamondback explorer. Cause of destruction is not obvious but high degree of fragment scattering suggests an explosion.

I plotted a route back to Pencil Nebula to hand in the recovered items to a search and rescue contact, and to hand in any cartographics too.

In Wregoe DG-F d11-12 I found a seemingly non existent outer ring around planet 2 with an inner radius of 821,529km and an outer radius of 3,286,116km.

I arrived back at New Growth. I earned just over 5.5mil in cartographics and got first discovery on the Plio Eurl NE-G d11-16 and Synuefe PE-F a107-3 systems. I redeemed 2,500 in codex entries. I got nearly 50k for handing in the black box and two sets of personal effects I found in Ghost of Jupiter.

Started out by investigating the rings of Kataraktis Nefon up close, I see why they call it waterfall of clouds now.

I boosted using the neutron star to HD 79792, a B class system with a neutron star 101Ly away.

I used the neutron star there to jump to Plio Eurl DM-D d12-19, 220Ly away. I found a gas giant with ammonia life and a 12,000km radius there, and I also found two water worlds. The gas giant here was the smallest radius I've ever encountered for its type, but not quite the smallest of any gas giant I've seen.

After a few jumps I arrived in the CD-39 6137 system at the centre of Eight Burst nebula. This nebula is a type 5 (snowball) on my nebula visual categorisation (NVC) system, also known as model P1 in the Catalogue of Galactic Nebulae. There are 35 real nebulae that use this model (more than any other model), as well as a large amount of procedurally generated planetary nebulae, making it the most commonly used nebula model.
This model is one of my favourites along with type 7 (oblong) nebulae such as Spirograph nebula.
I visited the tourist beacon and a ringed water world moon in this system. It was quite spectacular.

I visited another bio site on the moon I landed on last time but it was yet again roseum trees. I decided to try the other moon with bio signs. To my dismay it was yet another roseum site. Same with the next. After several disappointments I returned to the original moon, feeling like the victim of some elaborate codex prank. I finally found some gypseeum brain trees at bio site 15 after 20 or so minutes including a 200km flight between bio signs. If these had've been roseum trees I would have called it quits right there but I was glad I found them, because the nearly luminescent green bark on the trees when the headlights shone on them was quite nice actually.

As I was going along my route I passed through HD 78786 which had a 13 solar radii G class star that strangely only had 0.9 solar masses.

My next waypoint was HD 78344, an O type supergiant with 87 solar masses but only 0.3 solar radii, a polar opposite to the previous star but even more strange.
The main star is orbited by 7 stars with plenty of rocky and metal rich moons. One of the stars is a ringed neutron star known as Kataraktis Nefon, translating as waterfall of clouds from ancient greek. the neutron star is also orbited by another star, making that M class star a moon.
Due to spending a lot of time searching for the gypseeum brain trees earlier I have to leave it here and return another day.

Started out with a quick hop to the Synuefe IL-N c23-19 system. I stopped by a roseum brain tree site on moon A1a. After this I ventured out to planet B2 to visit a guardian site and scan the guardian relic tower there for the codex. I arrived at the site and immediately scanned the tower; I then poked around a bit more, but was soon chased out by swarms of guardian missiles.

Following my escape from the guardian site I travelled to the Pencil Sector EL-Y d5 system to visit the New Growth asteroid base, an independent terraforming and agricultural base orbiting a terraformable HMCW, controlled by the Seven Stages Movement.
I sold 1.2mil of cartographics and redeemed 105,000 credits of codex entries.

Next waypoint is the high mass system of HIP 47126, which contains a B class supergiant, 2 neutron stars, and an A class star. I'm going to experiment with turning off both M and K class stars for this leg of the journey, the route is 4 jumps regardless.
The first neutron star was a quasar only 30Ls away from the main star, making a nice view on entry to the system. The other stars were 3kLs out so I didn't visit them. From here I could neutron jump straight to my next waypoint: Wregoe WO-Z d13-6, only 157Ly away, more than close enough with my new 240Ly neutron jump range.

This system contained two moons with bio signs. I opted to land on moon A2b, which despite being listed as atmosphereless, had some kind of dusty miasma coating the planets' surface, a phenomenon I've encountered before on a few worlds. The first site was a roseum site so I flew the 100km or so to the next site over to check that one. The fog filled craters and grey, barren surface made this moon truly eerie. Unfortunately this site was also roseum trees. I'll get the gypseeum brain trees tomorrow.

Over the past few days I've been working on a new Krait Phantom for exploration.
The ship isn't fully outfitted yet, still requiring a pre-engineered FSD and a better power plant so I'm taking another trip in my reliable AspX,the Rook.

The Rook recently had a new pre-engineered FSD added, bringing its jump range over 60Ly. This should speed up travel a good bit, making this already short trip even shorter.
The route will bring me to several guardian/brain tree sites and other pois around the Pencil Nebula/ Regor sectors for sightseeing and codex filling. I'm especially looking forward to the guardian beacon and lividum brain trees.

Listening to the music of HOME, Voyager, and oDDling really reminds me of the last time I was out this side of the bubble,just over a year ago, my first exploration trip, travelling between Deciat and the Coalsack in a nearly stock sidewinder. That sidewinder is still docked at Fort Xeno in the Coalsack, where I bought the Rook.

In just a few minutes I had traversed the distance between 64 Ceti and Kappa-1 Volantis, a trip that would have likely taken me days just a year ago in my sidewinder.
There was both roseum and lividum brain trees reported in this system but I had already found and scanned roseum brain trees a few months back while gathering mats for a guardian fsd booster so my target was the lividum brain trees.
The only requirements for roseum trees were to be on a planet surface with volcanism and temp. between 200-500K. Lividum's requirements were to be on a rocky body with volcanism and temp. between 300-500K so hopefully I can correctly guess which are lividum from the map.
Unfortunately all planets with bio signs fit both sets of criteria. The first site I landed at on body B1a was a roseum site but was spectacular none the less. While leaving the site I saw a blue trail in the sky, as I approached, the ship producing it high waked out of the system, rather unusual for an uninhabited system. I landed at another bio site near the north pole of the same body and found a lividum site, I was only going there to get a good view of the ringed brown dwarf this moon orbited, I didn't think it was actually possible to find different species on the same body.

Next waypoint is Synuefe RY-E b45-6, a system where viride brain trees have been reported.
This system had many gas giants including 3 with water based life. Only one body (A2a) had bio signs and it also had the conditions for viride brain trees. The trees were on the slope of a rebound peak in a small crater, it was rather dim but putting the high beams on in my srv lit the area enough.

Next waypoint is Synuefe ZD-G b44-0, the reported location of some sulphur dioxide ice fumaroles. I didn't see any sulphur dioxide geo activity in this system so I skipped on to HIP 36823, the reported location of a guardian beacon.

I decided to stop by the fleet carrier 'High Charity' in this system just in case something went wrong and I was chased out of the beacon in a hail of guardian missiles. The carrier had no universal cartographics so I had to hold onto my data but at least I wouldn't end up back in the bubble if something went wrong.
The beacon was located in an ominous cloud, I approached it and scanned, half expecting sentinels to burst out and ambush me, but I was safe. I was amazed by both the scale of the beacon, and the great views of the planet it orbited and the star.

I decided that I wanted to finish my expedition today, so I went back in to reach my last two pois.

Witch's Pools was a system with 3 water worlds, 2 proto lagrange clouds, and another NSP in a ring.
In the first proto lagrange cloud I found only flavum metallic crystals, in the second I found albulum gourd molluscs (identical except for colouration to the croceum gourd molluscs I'd seen before) with the flavum metallic crystals. In the ring I found purpureum and prasinum metallic crystals densely packed in.

Radioactive Green is a green gas giant with ammonia based life (although the codex defined it as a GGG with water life, like the other GGG I encountered in Sanguineous Rim where I didn't see the green colour). It also has a tourist beacon as it is close to the Bubble.

Crab Expedition is now concluded after 278 days, 4 hours, and 16 minutes. It may have 2 less parts than the Nebula Tour but it took much longer, and brought me much farther.

Next up
Although the Crab Expedition is now concluded I have plans for the near future to visit brain tree sites east of the Bubble, and to visit the Ring and Fine Ring Nebulae.

Passed through the HD 57728 system which just so happened to be on my route. The map listed it as a G supergiant star, but since it's luminosity was only II on the scale it only counted as a giant for the codex.

Neutron jumped from the Wregoe EV-Y d4 system.

Passed through HIP 33546.

First route ended in the HIP 32357 system (Col 70 obstructed the straight route to Rigel). A route direct to Rigel could be made from this system.

Neutron jumped from Synuefe YV-T d4-30.

Arrived at Rigel B rather than Rigel A for some reason.

Stopped at the Witch Head Science Centre in HIP 23759, the original deep space outpost for this nebula. Sold 7 million in cartographics and 52,500 in codex entries.

Bought an eagle at Port Wheeler in Siniang to go Thargoid spotting.
Tried going to some threat level 3 and 4 sites but the scouts were too fast to scan since the comp scanner doesn't auto lock like the data link scanner.
Went to a threat 5 site and scanned the Cyclops class interceptor but got destroyed on the way out.

Next up
I've switched back to the Rook (AspX) to continue on towards Witches Pools and Radioactive Green pois. Then it's back to bubble

4/2/24
Found a K class system with 1 ELW, 2 WW, and 2 worlds with bark mounds.
Visited HD 34467, a giant carbon star with 50.9 solar radii size.
Visited MZ Aurigae which had a black hole and neutron star.

5/2/24
Visited Outotz LS-K d8-3. There was 26 fleet carriers and crystalline shards. Stopped at one carrier to restock my SRV after I failed to summit a nearby mountain due to too steep slopes and self destructed.

10/2/24
Visited HD 50580.
Visited Outotz ST-I d9-6. There was 4 thargoid signals on one rocky moon, mostly concentrated around the northern polar region. There was 1 structure and 3 barnacle sites.

11/2/24
Had an encounter with a medusa class interceptor at one of the barnacle sites, my first time seeing an intact thargoid interceptor.
Visited HD 49368, a massive S class giant star with a size of 173 solar radii but the colour of a brown dwarf.
Re-entered Inner Orion Spur, my final region change of the expedition.
Entered the PSR J0751+1807 system, aka Keck Binary Pulsar.

Future plans
The Crab Expedition is finally drawing to a close as I am now on the Bubble side of Barnard's Loop for the first time in 9 months. I have now hit most of the points of interest I intended on visiting.
Due to the Col 70 region interfering with route plotting I will be manually plotting my way towards Rigel, then stopping in Witch Head for a break before continuing on towards the Witch's Pools poi and then onto the Radioactive Green GGG, which will be my final waypoint before making my way back into the Bubble.

29/1/24
Re-entered Sanguineous Rim.
Visited HIP 19245.

3/2/24
Found a K class system with 7 stars (Outopps PK-M c21-0).
Visited HD 276481 and got the codex entry for terraformable rocky body with no atmosphere.
Visited HIP 22664 and found a very nice ringed water world.
Visited HIP 22580.
Neutron jumped from Outopps VD-K d8-15.

Reached the Flaming Star Nebula, home to Flaming Star Logistics Centre, run by a military dictatorship known as Flaming Star Logistics Operations.
This was the first station I encountered in 120 days.
I sold approx. 72.2million in cartographic data. 465,000 in codex discoveries. Repaired all damages (including getting a new coat of paint).
I registered 60 new first discovered systems, 13 of which were of d mass or greater.

From here the journey will continue towards Barnard's Loop, hitting a few interesting systems along the way. After that I will head towards Witch Head Nebula and then will be on the final stretch back home.