The Planetary Circumnavigation Club

Stern Winter · Jan 30, 2019

Update: Circumnavigation complete.

Here are a few impressions from my trip:

Started at 0/0 degrees

My fliving sessions didn't last long; only a handfull of degrees each time:

There are many more between those, but I won't bore you too much.

So after putting my SRV into the garage, I treated myself to a nice long massage, courtesy of my Beluga's robotic wellness studio, then relaxing in the sauna followed by a leisurely swim in the Olympic-sized heated pool. A steak dinner prepared to perfection by my ship's automatic chef, accompanied by a glass of Shiraz from the wine cellar on deck 6, and I was ready to call it a day.

Refreshed, I started out the next day, planning on reaching 240 degrees and finishing the circumnavigation the day after.

In the beginning, things went much as the day before, but after reaching 151 degrees, something clicked (or I was just lucky) and I got some air (in excess of 3km) and had a long fliving session until -74 (286) degrees. I stopped boosting at that altitude for fear of going into orbit and failing the circumnavigation.

Thus encouraged, and thinking I would finish soon, I continued on and started a video recording to document the end of my circumnavigation (and showing my mediocre skills):

[video=youtube_share;B9vXp72sBhk]https://youtu.be/B9vXp72sBhk[/video]

In the end I overshot by nearly 17 degrees.

Thanks for your patience. Fly fast, everyone.

Amargosa · Jan 30, 2019

Who will be the first to circumnavigate a 25000km+ radius planet?

Ian Phillips · Jan 30, 2019

Amargosa said:
Who will be the first to circumnavigate a 25000km+ radius planet?

I don't know exactly how big it is, but I am planning on circumnavigating Pluto when we can land on planets with atmospheres.

Jonas Treesong · Jan 31, 2019

Backtracking from Distant Worlds 2 WP3 to Quantum World to do the circumnavigation on Saturday February 3rd...

mtt9999 [Parabolus] · Jan 31, 2019

What's the biggest planet circumnavigated so far? Driving not flyving

mtt9999 [Parabolus] · Jan 31, 2019

Jonas Treesong said:
Backtracking from Distant Worlds 2 WP3 to Quantum World to do the circumnavigation on Saturday February 3rd...

Was planning on skipping this poi in favor of deep galaxy exploration en route to wp3. Now I'm intrigued. I feel like I would need to start tonight or friday though. Still would likely watch everyone pass me by! Start at 0,0 but head which direction first? North?

Alec Turner · Jan 31, 2019

Stern Winter said:
Update: Circumnavigation complete.

Hey Stern - Congratulations!

Just wanted to say I haven't forgotten you and I'll get the OP of this thread (and your complimentary glass of members lounge Prosecco) sorted out soon but I've been busy meeting my Sagittarius Eye writers dealine and once again find myself at the end of another day.

Tomorrow for sure!

o7

Jonas Treesong · Jan 31, 2019

mtt9999 [Parabolus] said:
Was planning on skipping this poi in favor of deep galaxy exploration en route to wp3. Now I'm intrigued. I feel like I would need to start tonight or friday though. Still would likely watch everyone pass me by! Start at 0,0 but head which direction first? North?

The official DW2 Discord announcement says start at North Pole and head for 90 degrees...

I might start early as well as I have limited time on Saturday.

Alec Turner · Jan 31, 2019

Jonas Treesong said:
The official DW2 Discord announcement says start at North Pole and head for 90 degrees...

I might start early as well as I have limited time on Saturday.

At the risk of embarrassing myself as founder of this club ...

It's cool that they've done that but ... surely 90° is the heading to take for an equatorial circumnavigation. If you start at a pole and take a heading of 90° don't you just spin round on the spot? Note: doing so will not be considered a true circumnavigation for the purposes of joining this club.

Kezika · Jan 31, 2019

Yeah if you're at the pole, 90 degrees just moves you around the spot, that's how I lined up with the Prime Meridian for the circumnavigation I am currently undergoing of Quantum World checkpointing poles and along the Prime Meridian and it's antipode.

So far I've made 3/4ths the trip, here's the first half video: (From North Pole to South Pole)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSx4EeoqYaU&t=1911s

And then last night I went from the South Pole to the Equator+Antipodal Meridian intersection. Gonna do the last quarter here in a bit.

Jonas Treesong · Jan 31, 2019

Alec Turner said:
If you start at a pole and take a heading of 90° don't you just spin round on the spot? Note: doing so will not be considered a true circumnavigation for the purposes of joining this club.

Can you not take any heading from the North Pole and do a circumnavigation as long as you maintain that original heading?

One just drives along the 90 degree meridian until you reach the South Pole and then, still maintaining 90 head back to the North Pole.

AFAIK it doesn't really matter whether you do a pole to pole to pole or a trek along the equator.

Should that be a rule for being a member of this club, I will unfortunately have to resign as I did a pole to pole to pole circumnavigation on Ariel...

Kerenn · Jan 31, 2019

Amargosa · Jan 31, 2019

Jonas Treesong said:
Can you not take any heading from the North Pole and do a circumnavigation as long as you maintain that original heading?

One just drives along the 90 degree meridian until you reach the South Pole and then, still maintaining 90 head back to the North Pole.

AFAIK it doesn't really matter whether you do a pole to pole to pole or a trek along the equator.

Should that be a rule for being a member of this club, I will unfortunately have to resign as I did a pole to pole to pole circumnavigation on Ariel...

You mean the 0 degree and 180 degree meridians, and a pole to pole circumnavigation isn't the same as a equatorial circumnavigation, as the pole one is shorter.

Jonas Treesong · Jan 31, 2019

Amargosa said:
as the pole one is shorter.

Why is that?

Alec Turner · Jan 31, 2019

Amargosa said:
You mean the 0 degree and 180 degree meridians

^^^ this

And no, go around any way you like. As long as you basically drove the circumference of the globe I don't think it really matters.

AkenBosch · Jan 31, 2019

Alec Turner said:
At the risk of embarrassing myself as founder of this club ...

It's cool that they've done that but ... surely 90° is the heading to take for an equatorial circumnavigation. If you start at a pole and take a heading of 90° don't you just spin round on the spot? Note: doing so will not be considered a true circumnavigation for the purposes of joining this club.

From what I can remember of the "planning" (spoiler: I can't plan stuff to save my life, I just had to make sure the numbers added up while I was going) of my polar circumnavigation of Enceladus, I started from a mid-latitude position and headed straight to 0° heading to reach the north pole, then 180° from there and back. Since I'm a bit on the stupid side of the human range I'm currently trying to envision a 90° heading with not much success, not sure if it would work the same or would make you drive in a spiral down to the equator, not even the handy image posted by Kerenn is helping me with that...all the studying I didn't do back when I really should is coming back at me for a vengeance.

Jonas Treesong said:
AFAIK it doesn't really matter whether you do a pole to pole to pole or a trek along the equator.

Should that be a rule for being a member of this club, I will unfortunately have to resign as I did a pole to pole to pole circumnavigation on Ariel...

As written above (and by Alec himself), I made a polar circumnavigation and did just fine. What goes around comes around, that's all that matters. [yesnod]

Amargosa said:
You mean the 0 degree and 180 degree meridians, and a pole to pole circumnavigation isn't the same as a equatorial circumnavigation, as the pole one is shorter.

Aside from the fact that I'm not totally sure the game is actually modeling oblate spheroids instead of simple spheres (there are a number of oblate potatoids for sure though), that still not relevant for the purpose of a proper circumnavigation. As soon you complete a ring around the thing you just actually circumnavigated it, doesn't matter the longitude, doesn't matter the lenght it took you.

mtt9999 [Parabolus] · Jan 31, 2019

Jonas Treesong said:
The official DW2 Discord announcement says start at North Pole and head for 90 degrees...

I might start early as well as I have limited time on Saturday.

Thanks everyone. I will land and see.

Funny thing is, when I'm orbiting I often can't tell pole from equator! Unless it has ice caps. Lol.

Anyway did some quick googling and we will start on equator at the prime meridian. We will head 90 degrees - which is east. Making this an equatorial circumnavigation.

Kezika · Feb 1, 2019

I have now completed my circumnavigation of Quantum World!

I will be rendering my other parts of the "dashcam footage" and getting it upload to YouTube as quickly as I can!

Alec Turner · Feb 1, 2019

mtt9999 [Parabolus] said:
Thanks everyone. I will land and see.

Funny thing is, when I'm orbiting I often can't tell pole from equator! Unless it has ice caps. Lol.

Anyway did some quick googling and we will start on equator at the prime meridian. We will head 90 degrees - which is east. Making this an equatorial circumnavigation.

Awesome. Good luck! It's a great experience, you'll learn a lot and finish a better driver that you started (hopefully).

Jonas Treesong · Feb 1, 2019

AkenBosch said:
What goes around comes around, that's all that matters.

lol, absolutely