)'(- The Drive Up

It’s been weeks since my return, and I still haven’t really expressed much on cyberspace about Burning Man… a stark contrast to my posting about FireDrums and UFG almost immediately upon arrival. Though for Burning Man, I can’t really preemptively structure a response. I have so much to express and I know my words will fail me, but now I’ve finally brought myself to just put my fingers to the keyboard and start typing about Burning Man and see what comes out, so here goes.

Once a day, every week, for the past several months, I’ve been attending meetings of the Hellfire Society conclave group of ~50 people. Together, we performed a 15-minute choreographed fire performance based on The Phantom of the Opera, and sent an audition video to the Burning Man Fire Council. Here’s the video if you’d like to watch it. We were selected to perform at 5:26, straddling front-and-center with Radiant Heat from Vancouver, Canada, in front of the man on Burn Night, right before the man burns (Saturday).

Here is a video of our performance in front of The Man:

So that was the core premise of the trip, logistically speaking. But I’ve wanted to go since I first heard about the festival in 2011. Oh, and our camp was placed in the center of Fire Village at 6:15 and G; basically the center of Black Rock City.

My roommate, landlord, and conclave friend drove me up as part of a 4-car caravan, led by a cargo truck with a 30-foot cargo trailer; we’re the early set-up crew for the Hellfire Society Camp, planning to show up on Thursday night and spend the next 3 days building things and preparing for the festival. We drove into a local campground at around 3:00 AM and crashed for the night before departing at around 8 AM the following morning.

This entire time, the hype is building around me, and it’s contagious. Everyone is behaving more… gently. Loosely. Every social interaction feels smother, at least with those traveling with me, all of whom have come to Burning Man before.

We stop by Reno for supplies and find the stores to be filled with people who are clearly going to burning man, based on their attire or vehicle, some of which are large cargo trucks adorned with camp logos, while others are hauling around trailers with art cars of various sizes.

I recognized some flow artists, but was too busy stocking up on supplies to socialize.

We reach the dust and it immediately begins pervading. Maybe two minutes of driving on the playa and dust is visibly gathering behind the truck’s dials. I sense a slight shift in the atmosphere, but my car-companions seem noticeably different, having smelled something far more distinct to them than anything I had picked up. “We’re back!” they cheer together.

I have no idea what I’m in for.

Hundreds of vehicles of every street-legal size are waiting at the entrance to Black Rock City, stopped as the ticketing and vehicle searching process bottle-necked the traffic to the point of vehicles stopping completely for roughly five minutes at a time, so many people, myself included, exited their vehicles to stretch their legs and walk around a bit.

We checked back in with our caravan and found some familiar faces among the nearby early set-up crews, and even made some new friends while the cars slowly crawled forward. It took about 5 hours total to pick up our tickets from will call, get the vehicle searched, and drive to the proper front gate where we were greeted, handed maps and information, and allowed into the city.

We drove to our campsite and set up our personal tents as well as a 15-foot diameter trampoline.

We all shared a beer and slept, though the night was a bit nippy. I had to wear two pairs of socks.

My mind was in a very strange place. The anticipation gave way to a strange calming mood… this was the most adventurous thing I’ve done so far in my adult life, and I was well aware of it, though that was really all I knew for certain so far.