As a way to say thanks if you enjoy the report, share it with your fellow burners, or friends who might be interested in burning man.
If you'd like to see reports from previous years, you can go to my main BM page, and especially if you don't know burning man, you should read my 2002 page which has more of an introduction. If you'd like to use my pictures in a commercial setting, drop me a line to discuss and I can give you full resolution pictures (marc<at>merlins.org).
If you'd like to say thanks with cash, please donate money to one of the many camps and art installations that are often out of pocket after burning man. If you don't know which one, please donate to Opulent Temple: https://www.opulenttemple.org
Summary:
Since last year, I still had my 128x192 pixel outfit, but was able to streamline its power system and playa-proof it a bit more to avoid contact with the elements. If you're interested, I wrote this page on version 6 of my LED outfit and if you'd like to know even more I've written a full article about my different LED outfits over the last 7 years, why and how. New this year, I had new arm and legs LED strings that were brighter and more reliable. Also, thanks to Speed Raver for this professional shot: So, let's get to it, the pictures by categories:
Black Rock City
Easy and unevenful flight:
got 2 rides from the newer bus/shuttle system from the airport to close to camp
it's a good place to go look for your lost keys
or your lost water bottles, or anything else
The Location Related Rain Problem: Weather and Rain
No major duststorms this year, but yeah, we had his little rain problem instead. I've stopped being a fan of the burning man location and the playa dust, a long time ago, but also pointed out almost 20 year ago that the location felt between very suboptimal and stupid to me, I mean, a lakebed that still gets flooded most years, what could possibly go wrong? (the alkaline playa dust that messes up all your stuff, and destroys electronics, is just a bonus). So yes, I love BM, no I really don't like the location. Obviously this year after 2 days of fairly heavy rain on and off, it really became a problem.Many burners shrugged it off as part of the experience, but I was personally quite disappointed about all the events and work that were cancelled as a result. Anyway, for me burning man mostly ended thurday night/friday morning a bit after sunrise, which wasn't much of a sunrise:
by then the wind was already quite high from the pressure front coming in.
people quickly figured out walking with ziplock bags and duct tape was the way to go, not fun though
a few took advantage to have a bit of fun :)
Kudos from Jaewon Jung from KNTV who did a much better job: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwywUTudtLw The reality, which I explained in soe of the video clips above, is that we were inconvienced for sure, lots of things were cancelled, some art was damaged, and it kind of sucked for many of us to be kind of suck within a short radius instead of being able to enjoy BM and have fun. The hardcore survivalists probably had a great time :) but for me it was disappointing to lose almost 3 days of BM, even if indeed were were totally fine the entire time.
Now, had this rain happened on sunday/monday/tuesday instead, it would have caused more problems because now it really would have stopped people from geting out (very few people want to get out on friday or saturday), and probably a few people would have fun low on food. Running low on water was never really going to be a problem, way too many people bring way too much water. I had twice as much as need like each year, not counting the bazillion gallons that my camp, had: Will BMorg move to another more suitable and safer location? I already asked more than once and the answer is "very unlikely". I'm told they've recently signed a multi year contract with the BLM to stay at this location, and it's true that they and a fair amount of camps have infrastructure and storage nearby, so moving at a radically different location would definitely cost a fair bit. I still think it should be done, but I understand it's not likely to, and that BM attendees will have to be ready for more extreme weather, and continue to deal with dealing and fixing all their gear that is covered and potentially eventually damaged by alkaline playa dust.
Drones
Before the weather turned to shit, going out at night was a lot of fun as always And two teams of drones (actually I'm told several team banded together) were nice enough to perform drone shows for us comprizing 100 or more drones depending on the show:Camps
This year again, I stayed with the wonderful people at Dustfish, and my tent did ok despite the rain: I brought an alledged 190W of solar panels, but since they weren't exactly matched and the ratings are always kind of a lie, I got 85W usable out of them in perfect conditoins, which was still useful to recharge my DC battery system:
top meter kept track of how much I used, bottom of how much I produced
I probably need to find a way to bring these extra panels next year, but they are mis-matched so they'll need a separate system
we also had showers with real toilets and enough water to survive the week, nicely done!
circle J was awesome to supplement what you migh have been missing
Opulent Temple had Opulent chill this year
Dave Dresden also played great trance that night
they had music synchronized bracelets
Sonic Soul Tribe was the 2 oclock club this year
Also the monkeys had a great setup
Distrikt had a great setup, but way out of the way at the end of 10
Art
I feel like I didn't get to see as much art this year, maybe there was a little less, and also the rain made things harder, especially for late setup, or refueling generators for night lights when you couldn't bike or drive around. I even unfortunately saw a set of solar panels that were rendered useless when the rain fried the power converters that were attached to them :( Of course, it gets even nicer at night:
sadly the storm was rough on some of the art
another thing to climb that was totally quite challenging we totally hoped was safe :)
felt less dangerous to climb, though
People
As each year, people pictures:
great to run into friends every year
Hi Karin, we climbed this deathtrap and neither of us died :)
yeah, it got messy around the end, some actually had boots, well done
Fire
Plenty of people doing fire dancing this year again, awesome!
sad to see a butterfly in flames :)
Vehicles
these guys brought the perfect vehicle for this year's conditions ;)
this cool art car had colors ...
... that were synchronized with the members' vests
mmmh, I see one of those every year, it's very far from its home
Temple
A new temple this year, another nice design. I didn't stay long enough to see it burn, especially since it was burned Tuesday this year, after most people had left, but here are a few pictures:
every year, a nice guy plays piano which you can hear insie the temple while contemplating the inside
The Man
Last but not least, the man, of course. The man didn't burn on saturday given the rain, nor did it burn on sunday, but by monday the playa was finally dried up enough to prep for the man burn: Because things were a bit weird with the unusual schedule, the fire conclave was not allowed to perform as normal within the man perimeter, so a few rebelled and performed right outside at 6 oclock around 20:00, and it was a good show as always:
thank you to the lovely people who offered food to us
more lovely people who made canadian poutine!
tuesday morning, last view before heading out
Conclusion
The gate was mostly closed from mid friday to mid monday, almost 3 days, due to heavy mud that most cars, except serious offroading ones, would get stuck in. By monday afternoon, one of the 2 runways re-opened, and by tuesday morning, after the burn, it was not that hard to get out. Somehow even the exodus line wasn't as terrible as it usually is.
crossing the 2 finally dried out small rivers that were created by the rain. This is where cars that tried to leave early, got stuck
So yes, I really wish the org would consider new locations, but I'm also not holding my breath about it happening, which is unfortunate because engineers and people who bring all the cool stuff, are unfortunately likely to eventually get tired of the worse and worse weather, and coudl just stop, making burning man less cool over time. I sincerely hope to be wrong, but I think the most likely way that will be true, will be for the org to pick a better location, if BMorg is reading this, please pretty please with cherry on top.
Related to this, this year I didn't bring any LED art piece due to the damage the playa did in past years, and this year again the playa dust got into both my expensive camera lenses, which has to be sent for repair/professional cleaning (I use real cameras because cell phones cannot take pictures nearly as good at night). So yeah, I really don't love the playa dust or general price to pay for that location for those who participate. I hope you enjoyed this report. Feel free to say thanks to me by simply sharing it with your friends, and see you on the playa in the future (or you'll see me at night with my lights).