After 2 years and 8 months of playing Eve, 3 accounts, and untold ships, I finally made the trip out to the "Eve Gate".
I had initially planned to log Kahamahl on to change skills, before swapping to my other characters to settle down to a stint of ratting to refill the wallets of my various characters. However I quickly realised that I couldn't be bothered ratting....
.... actually I was just too tired to contemplate it.
The thought of zipping out into Black Rise to try some solo hunting in the new Taranis popped into my mind, but was quickly ended by the report of an enemy fleet camping the Villore gate in Old Man Star.
Some discussion on CrazyKinux's blog several weeks back had left in mind the seed of an idea, and suddenly it fell due.
So instead I brought up the map, clicked search and entered 'New Eden'. Followed quickly by a click of 'set destination' and a glance at the left to see how many jumps I was looking at.
21 jumps - through Amarr space (ah well why not fly through enemy high sec for the first time as well) - making a total of 42 jumps return from Villore to the Gate and back.
The Taranis was the obvious ship to choose for this journey, especially given that the other options were a old shuttle and an unfitted Brutix.
The Taranis is a fantastic interceptor, it may feel like a sluggish assault frigate after flying other interceptors such as the Stiletto or Crow (my other favourites), but boy does it have a bite that no other interceptor can match. Three tech 2 Blasters, combined with two Hobgoblin IIs, providing a substantial level of DPS from such as small hull.
The trip to the gate, to the amarr space, and indeed right to the gate and back passed quite uneventfully.
Entering Amarr space generated the expected notification that Amarr Navy vessels will engage me upon site. Which given that I never saw an Amarr Navy vessel, was really false and deceptive advertising.....
Passing into the low-sec surrounding the gate proved to be no more successful in generating any possible content. Indeed the locals seemed well trained to warp and log upon an unidentified individual entering system.
Reaching New Eden, I admittedly felt a bit like the Penguins in the movie "Madagascar" upon reaching the Antarctic. In short, a bit underwhelmed!
The Eve Gate itself looks pretty, but somehow I had expected there to be something a bit more. Perhaps I know too little of the lore, but I would have imagined a site such as the Eve Gate would have attracted a little bit more attention, i.e. scientific vessels, tourism, etc...
Instead, there was just me, and one other in local, and a big bright gate....
I took quite a few screenshots, as any good tourist should, but as per the above comment, there was no where to get the obligatory "My Cousin/Uncle/Granddad/etc went to the Eve Gate, and all I got was this..." T-shirt.
The trip back to Villore gave me time (to be exact, 21 gates and systems worth) to think, especially about the fact that I had on short notice willingly gone on a 42 jump round trip just to "see" something.
I blame that on living on 0.0 and the distances you sometimes have to travel to get anywhere.
I came to realise that I had been underwhelmed because it had just not felt like much of an adventure.
I can imagine for a 'newish' pilot, a trip out into an old empty, uninhabited bit of space, where we are meant to have come through from the old world, would seem exciting. However to a 2+ year player, it just feels like just another jaunt to the corner dairy for a paper and a pack of cigarettes.....
That all said, I am glad I finally went and can say that I have been.
Indeed it is something every long term player should do at least once while they play Eve.
