The first planet in the system (closest to the sun) is a blue gas giant shown here.
However the bonus of this system was the outer-most planet, a metal rich planet with high volcanic activity and planetary rings.
I have seen just a few planets like this in my travels, it's an amazing sight as you approach it.
But when you get to these planets, it seems a shame to not get really close to those rings. I entered the rings so I could assess them for mining, but also to get some amazing views from within the rings.
As you can see the rings themselves are made up of rocks, and you can fly around inside the rings, mining minerals or metals. It's these places where you quite often find some pirates hiding out, who will scan you for your cargo contents, and attack if they find the contents interesting. Even out here in the wilds you can see a couple of ships on my scanner.
My ship is equipped with mining equipment (a mining laser and a refinery), so I can cut pieces from these rocks, scoop them up, and let the refinery convert them into tonnes of cargo which I can sell on. Depending on where you are, this can be very profitable.
Here you can see a piece I cut from a rock which is 27% Lepidolite. I will do another post purely on mining in the future.
The next waypoint was the system HIP 4755. Not a remarkable system, except for one thing... LIFE... Life in the galaxy is a rare occurrence outside the human-populated systems, so these planets are prized when you find them, and factions pay extra credits for these finds.
This is the sort of planet that will encourage a faction to expand it's territory, as it's ideal to set up a station nearby, and start fresh human colonies. This planet was described as a "Water World" in the scanned description, but it appears to have quite a lot of land mass to support human colonies so will definitely be worth exploring.
The next waypoint was HR 266, which was recommended for it's mining potential. It had a large star (and a smaller brown dwarf star), and a number of metal rich and gas giants with ring systems to be mined.
This is what the closest planet to the star looked like on approach. A very impressive ring system.
I didn't spend long in this system, I will return another time, there were other sights to be had, and I really wanted to get to the Nebula.
27 Gamma Cassiopeaie was my final waypoint before I got to the nebula, a black hole and neutron star. Both are deadly bodies, getting too close can overheat your ship because of the gravimetric distortions or the radiation pouring off the star. I scanned the phenomena and moved on.
From here I made my final jumps to the nebula, where I took some pictures of the ships that accompanied me that night.
The nebula is a beautiful sight. We found a system we could jump to so we could get a picture of everyone in-front of it.
Here are a couple of the ships that made it to the Nebula, the one on the left is called an Asp, and is the same ship I fly for my exploration trips (I have two other ships docked in Federation Stations back in civilized space). You can acquire custom paint jobs for your ship, the Asp here is in yellow and black, mine is in what I called "Space 1999 white". The ship on the right is a Lakon Type-6, typically a trading vessel, but it has a long jump range, so can also be used for exploration.
My next post will be the journey home, a few more planets to look at, and an encounter with a pirate.
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