My 2nd Burn – Part 1
October 3rd, 2007
I started this entry a little over three weeks ago and never posted it. So here it is. I’ll try to get Part II out shortly.
I have been back in town for a little over a week and I am still having Burning Man dreams. I keep waking up half asleep and thinking that I am still there. This was my second year and it was 100 fold better than last year. I had the great fortune of camping with an amazing group of people. There were 24 of us, and it felt like one big family. We had dinner together every night, and most mornings/afternoons we had breakfast together.
It all started with five of us, Denise, Amy, Marc, Jens, and myself leaving town on a Saturday in an RV and driving down to Summer Lake. An amazing hot springs about five hours from the playa. We stayed there for Saturday and Sunday night and had a blast.
Got into BRC on Monday late afternoon. It took us a little over an hour and a half because Jens had to pick up his ticket from will call, found our camp and began setting our shit up. Which wasn’t too bad since Amy, Denise, and myself where staying in an RV. The only issue was figuring out where to park it, since there was one more RV, two vans and a truck with a trailer that were due to arrive the following day. I helped Marc and Jens set up their tents, and then the partying began.
What an amazing Monday night. The playa was jumping and full of energy that night. The veteran burners said that it felt like a Wednesday or Thursday, and based on my memory from last year I had to agree. We rode our bikes around the playa checking out what was there at the time. One of the cool things about getting there early in the week is that you get to see the city built. Everyday you find something new that was not there the day before. Its pretty amazing. We ended up at the Opulent Temple to dance and await the lunar eclipse. When the eclipse was half way complete we jumped back on our bikes to watch the rest of it from The Temple. It was pretty cool. There was about six of us arm in arm watching the Earth’s shadow cover the Moon. Just as it was about to be complete, around 3am, people where howling and screaming at the moon. I scanned the horizon and noticed that I didn’t see The Man. He is usually lit up. Thats when I noticed that one of his legs was on fire. “Holy Shit! The man is on fire!”, I screamed. We all jumped on our bikes, completely forgot about the eclipse, and rode over to the man to see what was going on. Apparently someone had succeeded in burning the man early this year. We couldn’t believe it. We watched as the fire crept up and engulfed the entire man. That is when the “fire department” showed up to put him out. It was pretty amusing. Once he was out we headed back to camp, chatting amongst ourselves what an amazing Monday it had been, and how we couldn’t wait to see what the rest of the week would bring. Everyone else stayed in camp, and I headed out on foot for my traditional first night solo stroll to see what I would see.
