The Big Trip: September 2014

For starters, let me say that Every Burning Man is different. There are things that are "better" and things that are "worse", but mostly things that are "different" and always, "wonderful", "amazing" and "a series of remarkable moments".

This year was exactly all of those things, and more.

My sister Suzie in Oregon volunteered to watch Delilah during Burning man week. She lives in Eugene, and in years past, we've had time to drive up there before the event, and stay several days to enjoy their company in Eugene. This year, because of a confluence of schedules, we had to figure out another way to get Delilah to Eugene. We wanted to make it easy on Suzie as possible, so at least one direction we wanted to fly D into Eugene, instead of Portland, which is a several hour round trip.

Flying an unaccompanied minor has gotten more and more difficult in the last few years, with only a few airlines doing it any more. And those few that do, the flight has to be non stop. To Eugene, you can fly non-stop from Oakland, Portland and Salt Lake City,.. Since I had to pick up Barbara in Santa Cruz the following Sunday, Oakland seemed reasonable. So I start looking for tickets - United has a ticket for an unaccompanied minor out of Oakland - one way, $560, or $480 R/T... Yikes! But, Allegiant air (whom I generally dislike for their nickle-n-dime attitude about everything) has flights from Oakland to Eugene for $68 one way... So, I drive the RV up to Oakland, hop on the plane with Delilah in the early AM, fly with her up to Eugene, watch her run into the lobby where my sister is waiting (Eugene is a VERY small airport) with her kids, blow them a kiss, and climb back on the same plane 30 minutes later for the return flight to Oakland.

Burning man started earlier this year - at noon on Sunday, as an experiment. So, we worked our way that direction and stayed in Nevada City the night before. The main line for us this time was the highway to Empire - people were stopping at the little store there and backing up the two lane highway for hours. Once we were past that, it was smooth sailing into Burning Man.

We found some space at our usual 7:30 and the outer ring, but noticed that it was already more packed than in previous years. I was greeted by a friendly neighbor as I started to set up the canopy, making for one of the easiest set-ups ever.

Sunday night, it rained - really rained. There was lightning which hit the man twice - but of course, they put lightning rods in him, so he survived. They had to close the gates though, since vehicles get bogged down in the mud. One of the people that camped with us, it took 22 hours for them to get from Reno to our camp...

After the rain, a muddy mess of people trying to get through.

This was an accidental shot - but I really like the shadow. What am I carrying? Serious cowboy look.

Our initial foray onto the playa. Do we look happy or what?

The temple was very late in opening - either Tuesday or Wednesday. Here, it is still being constructed. Turns out that the original folks that were going to do the temple backed out in April, so the backup got the contract - with no time to spare. Then there were the rains - raining three times in the two weeks they had to set up, and each time the equipment has to wait a day or more for the playa to be solid enough to operate on. Then, the chief artist was a former wife of Robin Williams, so had to go attend his funeral. The temple was technically beautiful, but didn't it just felt sad. I don't know if there wasn't enough time to imbue it with the human grace and wonder that usually balances the sadness out, or if it was the overwhelming theme of death, or what - but the normal multifaceted set of feelings that I've experienced in most of the past temples wasn't here this year.

giant altar to a toilet in the background

Embrace - one of the major art pieces. You could climb up inside, and even crawl in between. It was burned later in the week - a sunrise burn, which was an interesting contrast.

This is the heart of the "Alpha" taller figure of embrace.

Deep playa shot

This was another random beautiful art - a genie bottle. We met one of the artists. Interesting gal, told us the story of the creation. There are physical and mathematical equations on each of the panels - as you might see the "expansion of pi" near Barbara's head

Beautiful internal detail.

Getting dark - the night side of the city comes to life

Balance

Lots of love

This year's theme was "Caravanasery" - a city that would sprout at the cross roads of the spice trade routes of days of yore. Some unique elements included that The Man was on the ground, instead of on a structure. He was also giant at 104' tall. Instead of the usual Circle Of Regional Effigies (CORE - structures built by regional groups like San Diego, Portland, Berlin, etc.), there was a Souk or Bazaar of tents. So the regionals, which were used to making structures, had to figure out what to do with a small tent area... It was an interesting experiment, but didn't allow for the interaction and connection and play with structures and people that the normal CORE did.

So many lights

A petrodactyl

This dragon ship seemed to follow us - it was one of the few things that we saw more than once. It must have called our neighborhood home...

A cute couple on the dance floor

Yes, that is a Flame throwing Sousaphone...

Dragon ship during the day

Paddle boat. Somehow this year we never got around to riding on an art car...

One of a million clubs at night

A woman in front of a TARDIS

And a space craft in front of a dungeon...

TIE fighter

and Steam Punk Tank

Pretty lady

This sphere was inside of one of the "Plug and Play" camps . Apparently you can pay $14 to $25k and just have your whole Burning Man experience prepared for you. This place looked like the desert Hilton or something. They take care of everything - food, water, showers, even bringing in Bikes and charging stations. Some had the off road Segway - but idiots driving them, texting and running in to things... It's a different part of the culture from the affluent Silicon Valley folks.