Second time around

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 6
Started off badly but developed into an excellent session.

To begin, I had to negotiate that hideous stretch of country ahead in the last pic, and it lived up to my expectations. Almost lost the varmint at one point with hull integrity down to 18%. But once I got through that I emerged on to the kind of wide, rolling prairie I've been dreaming about. Even better, it was easier to chase wavescanner signals and I was rewarded with a couple of metallic meteorites and another few mesosiderites that yielded 12 phosphorus between them, which has eased my refuel fears somewhat.

Also threw up today's space junk:

I was hoping the kinder terrain would last until I hit 65° east, which would mark 45° travelled and has become somthing of a major waypoint in my mind. Sadly, all good things come to an end and I found myself facing a major mountain wall stretching across the route as far as I can see (which isn't far - darkness again).

Still, a full four degrees travelled

 

[Phongsalt]

Is it possible the space debris comes from the decaying orbits of destroyed ships?
That might explain the blue lines.I've been keeping an eye out since this came up,so far without luck.But i have seen them once or twice before,and wondered.There is so much to wonder at in this game, i didn't spend too long chasing 'a trick of the light'.
But now my curiosity is piqued.
Oh,and another question.Are you chasing the sun or running towards it?
Safe travels.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Is it possible the space debris comes from the decaying orbits of destroyed ships?

Possible, but there are plenty of ships buzzing around and landing. Ship wreckage could be bad landings, and I've seen multiple cargo dumps protected by skimmers, like this one just now:

As for the sun, I honestly have no idea. Of the 7 or 8 sessions I've put in, I'd guess I've been in daylight for three of them, but when it has been daylight the star has been pretty much behind me. Never seems to get very high in the sky.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 7
Glory be... daylight!!

At close of play yesterday I finished facing that rather severe mountain wall in the last pic of post 22. In fact, it turned out to be easier than it appeared. You can just see a notch off to the right/north and following that around I found an easy valley running to the southwest, which brought me out to another one of those deadend bowls. The walls to the west and north presented a good deal of difficulty, requiring another hull repair before I managed to get up on to a high plateau.

Having been pushed south by that valley earlier, I headed northwest but then found the slopes getting steeper and pushing me way north. Ended up around two degrees (20km) north of the equator. After that, the going was a lot easier and I managed to push the speed up to 20m/s - woo! Most of the time I consider 10m/s to be pretty good.

All told, I've covered a lot of ground today; sadly, most of it was going north and south rather than west. Finished the day at 65.3° east - not quite the full 45° of progress but close enough that I consider it a victory. So, one-eighth of the journey complete. If I maintain current game time and progress, I should be finished in early January

Here's the prospect, and already twilight, which bodes ill for tomorrow:

 

[mpfj]

Loving the story

I have a nagging voice that keeps telling me I need to do a circum-nav trip.
Just another thing to add to the "to-do" list

 

[Rustnsawdust]

I have a nagging voice that keeps telling me I need to do a circum-nav trip.

Everyone should drive all the way around a moon at least once. One of the most challenging things to do in the game, I think - but a great deal of fun, too. And every now and again, the scenery is simply stunning

 

[Alec Turner]

Everyone should drive all the way around a moon at least once. One of the most challenging things to do in the game, I think - but a great deal of fun, too. And every now and again, the scenery is simply stunning

Hear hear. The First Great Planetary Expedition around Kumay (my second circumnavigation) was the most "real" thing I've ever done in Elite and I have so many strong memories of that journey. In fact, just this very morning I was thinking that maybe ... maybe .... on the anniversary of that expedition (which would be next May) I might do it again - same planet, same route, but going the opposite direction (appropriate given the title of this thread).

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 8
Domestic chores have kept me out of the SRV for a couple of days, but today LOML is out and since I am suffering a streaming cold I have been excused duty. So back at it for a couple of hours, and what an enjoyable session it was.

Managed to keep up a good speed on some fairly gentle terrain. Of course, there were a few stretches of those ridge ripples that force a slowdown but compared to traversing the mountain ranges, they're a stroll in the park (although I doubt anyone could to it in VR without losing their lunch!). This is looking back over most of the terrain I covered:

And looking ahead:

From here, it was slow progress over that ridgeline ahead and then back up to speed again. That valley wall ahead to the right is too difficult to ascend, but that's OK because it's pushing me southwest towards the equator.

I've found plenty of outcrops that have produced another 15 or so phosphorus, so the fuel situation is comfortable for now. The only mistake I've made was coming across another of those crashed satellite/beacon things. So far, all of the junk has been 'no faction', so when a skimmer popped up I just shot it and scanned the data point. Then I got a message in comms from some NPC telling me I was doomed. Haven't seen the fella, but he messages me from time to time to remind me I'm about to be rendered to spacedust. If he does attack me I probably am doomed, so fingers crossed he's all mouth and no blasters.

At end of session, I'm about a kilometer north of the equator and just under 62° east, so a around 40km covered today:

Next session will start with that rough terrain immediately ahead, but then that shallow valley looks to be heading in my direction so here's hoping for more good progress.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 9
More progress today, a mix of that slower rough terrain and much faster open country.

The incidence of space junk is becoming ridiculous - directly encountered six of them this morning, mostly those protected cannister dumps, but also a parked Sidewinder and this one:

Crashed satellite which, at least, gave me something useful, specialized legacy firmware. There were at least another two or three others on the wavescanner but not directly on my route so I ignored them. That's all within the space of about 40km!

Ended the session at 57° east, total distance travelled so far: 53°.

Looks like a bumpy start to tomorrow.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 10
As predicted, the day got off to a rough start having to cross those icy, mountainous ridges in the last pic above. And then it got worse. I'm constantly surprised at how easy it is to get into situations that are extremely difficult to get out of. On the far side of those ridges, about where the grey terrain leads into the distant blue, I found myself in an area of needle-like rocky spikes. Often on these bodies you can get a sense of the terrain generator at work - this bump map, overlaid on that height map. And then suddenly some sadist throws in a patch of white noise and the terrain makes no sense at all.

So I had to resort to my usual tactic of jumping off and hoping for the best. 'Best' would be better if I could control the SRV in the air, but what usually happens is I overcompensate and end up rolling, hitting a rock on the roof, and then tumbling all the way to the bottom. Luckily, I've practised this enough that I can do a hull repair in mid-bounce.

After further struggles I eventually got up on to some better terrain and started to make good progress, interrupted by the usual garbage like this:

No idea what it was, but there were a couple of cannisters and a cargo rack. And two skimmers. I decided the cargo rack might yield something useful so shot the skimmers and was rewarded with a few rare raw mats.

A long spell of relatively easy travel came to an end when I became aware of something deep, dark and menacing encroaching from the south and cutting me off to the west. Cresting a rise I found myself staring into the abyss:

And a quick glance at the system map revealed the extent of the problem:

Getting into a ravine rarely presents a problem, but getting out again can be almost impossible (and is likely to prove so eventually), so I took the cautious approach and tried to skirt around to the northwest in hope of finding a way across. And thought I found one, until I realised the error of my way and found myself facing this:

That curtain wall will be tomorrow's first challenge. In the meantime, I'm at a little under 53° east, so 57° of longitude travelled in total.

 

[NorthernDevo]

Loving the story

I have a nagging voice that keeps telling me I need to do a circum-nav trip.
Just another thing to add to the "to-do" list

Yup, same here - this is a fantastic tale of adventure! It's got my back teeth tingling; wanting to chew on some long-range terrain.
Hmm...looking at my mats...Iron,Nickel and Sulphur are all topped out; 140 in Phosphorus. I'll top it up, then just might give it a try once I get back into the Bubble (I doubt I'll find much scannable debris out in Achille's Altar).

 

[Rustnsawdust]

(I doubt I'll find much scannable debris out in Achille's Altar

You'd be surprised! I sympathize with FD - it's great to see unexpected things while out exploring, but it feels too common right now. A crashed thing every few hundred kilometres would be great; a crashed thing every 10km feels really meh! As I mentioned up thread, one the one hand I'm only a couple of hundred ly from Colonia so there's probably a fair amount of traffic around. On the other, this system was undiscovered until I dropped into it a couple of weeks ago so the amount of junk I'm finding is remarkable (and implausible).

Regardless, I heartily recommend a circumnavigation - makes you feel like a real explorer

 

[NorthernDevo]

You'd be surprised! I sympathize with FD - it's great to see unexpected things while out exploring, but it feels too common right now. A crashed thing every few hundred kilometres would be great; a crashed thing every 10km feels really meh! As I mentioned up thread, one the one hand I'm only a couple of hundred ly from Colonia so there's probably a fair amount of traffic around. On the other, this system was undiscovered until I dropped into it a couple of weeks ago so the amount of junk I'm finding is remarkable (and implausible).

Regardless, I heartily recommend a circumnavigation - makes you feel like a real explorer

Chuckle - if I found a satellite out here near the Rim I would certainly be surprised!
But ooohhh....what an adventure.
Just dropped onto a moon and while exploring picked up about 30 Phosphorus. I'll top that out, then find a REALLY small moon for my first try! LOL
(Actually, that Crystal Shard moon would be great - 0.02 G; took forever to collect the yttrium since it's hang time was about 30 seconds. Driving would be tough in that gravity but the diameter is relatively short. Hmmmm..... )

 

[iain666]

Chuckle - if I found a satellite out here near the Rim I would certainly be surprised!

I found one right out on the south western fringes once.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 11 & 12
Haven't managed much time in the SRV this last week, but a couple of brief sessions on Monday and today.

The major excitement of the journey so far occurred on Monday and I thought my time was up. I crested a ridge and found myself skidding into one of those protected cannister zones, tried to avoid it, skidded out and flipped the varmint, and ended up inside the zone upside down. By the time I'd got myself righted, I'd triggered the security response. No problem, I thought... I can avoid the skimmers and continue on my way. Then from behind a nearby hill, up popped a Viper with his "I have you now" schtick and he proceeded to chase me for over an hour, shooting lumps out of the SRV all the way.

With real-life duties awaiting, I quit and endured the countdown timer, but thought I was done for if he kept after me. Fortunately, when I logged in today there was no sign of him - must have got bored waiting for me

Shortly before that, I did hit one of my minor waypoints: 50 east:

Today I've enjoyed some fast, easy travel crossing a series of rolling hills and shallow valleys, with an occasional steeper valley wall to traverse. After my last close encounter I've been wary of man-made signals on the wavescanner, but this one was right in front of me so I made a cautious approach. Biggest bit of junk I've ever seen:

No idea what it is - looks rather like a couple of sections from a megaship. I made a careful circuit and couldn't see any data points or other bits of interest. There is a trespass zone so I'm not inclined to go poking around.

Seemed like a good point to end the day, so I'm here at 42° east. Total distance covered: 68° of longitude.

 

[Orvidius]

There's no shame in combat-logging on an NPC.

 

[NorthernDevo]

Yikes! a little TOO exciting there, Rust!

Glad you're back into it - I'm enjoying your journey immensely

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 13
Back to it this morning, and more good progress was made. I enjoyed another stretch of that easy, rolling terrain but after a while it became obvious that change was coming. Slopes were getting steeper, and changing direction more frequently. Eventually I topped a low hill and saw this ahead:

I thought I'd try that notch in the hills in the upper-left, despite the forbidding nature of that black shadow in the distance. As these things tend to, it got ugly in a hurry and some rolling and tumbling ensued. Happily, it only cost me some 20% of hull integrity before I emerged onto more of the flatter terrain I like so much. This shot was taken some distance further on but shows what I've been enjoying:

Yet another session in darkness, which I don't mind much but for two things. One, the night vision fools the brain into seeing grass-covered hills, which lulls you into a false sense of comfort. And two, it has been impossible to capture any good images of the scenery (assuming there's any decent scenery to see!).

But I can always depend on RNG to throw up a hunk of junk for random interest. Of course, when I logged on this morning the wreckage of yesterday had vanished as mysteriously as it arrived. No doubt this one will be gone tomorrow:

Another smuggler/pirate meets a just end. His cargo of narcotics and weapons blinking in the vacuum.

After a session of pretty rapid travel, I logged off here at 36° east, for a total distance of 74° travelled. Next major waypoint will be 20° east - one quarter of the circumnavigation.

 

[Rustnsawdust]

Day 14
I'm learning that retirement doesn't apply to weekends . But, a new week, a new leg of the journey. And, glory be: daylight!

Last time I talked about the illusion in night vision of rolling, grassy hills. Compare and contrast in this look back over the easy terrain of the last few sessions:

But that was about to change:

And here's looking back when I was in the middle of that bumpy stuff:

That made for an hour or so of slow going as I had to pick my way across several outcrops like this. Happily, today's second hour saw me emerge onto another wide plateau and I made up good time. At the end of the session, here I am at a little east of 30°E, and a good 80° covered in total so far.

Tomorrow will start with that valley wall directly ahead. Giving a hostage to fortune, I'll say it doesn't look too bad from here .

 

[Nick Sticks]

Retirement is the illusion.