Working on a much longer write-up of my recent trip to Chicago, but I haven't even posted about my trip before that yet. It's been a busy but fantastic two weeks for me. This post will be more of a highlights post since of course there was a lot of awesomeness that I'm not quite comfortable making public ;).
We got in around noon on Friday. Found a spot for out tent in our theme camp (The Schmear) and got set up pretty quickly. The first step in our exploration led us to the ferris wheel! One of the unique things about this burn is it takes place on Virginia Key, which is open to the public most of the year and actually has some permanent fixtures, like a ferris wheel and public bathrooms. Some purists are kind of against these things, but really nothing beats a real toilet and running water sometimes, so I'm not going to act like these aren't major pluses. And what better way to get the lay of the land than from 100 feet in the air?
This really shows only one of the main sound areas, but these were some of the biggest and most impressing stages there. I am forever in awe of what people manage to bring to and build at these things.
Some more wandering around and it was nap and rally time. Flying in on a 6am flight definitely had us a bit drained and I am a big proponent of the 4:30 nap at these things. Wake up refreshed and ready to conquer the night! We got dressed and headed back to the effigies for the first burn and some fireworks!
I usually like the first night at these things to be fairly subdued. No reason to go hard the first night and be nursing a hangover the rest of the way. These are marathons, not sprints. I'm also terrible at remembering to take pictures while I'm having fun, but some highlights from Friday night include: Playing at the charcade (think fireshooting skeeball machine and pinball machine), finding a random camp with a cotton candy machine (that completely disappeared the next day), and stumbling upon a very thoughful camp that left a make your own taco station out for hungry burners. We called it a relatively early night since our camp brunch was the next morning.
Saturday started out with our camp bagel brunch! We brought 600 bagels and schmear to serve with mimosas and bloodies to bring some New York brunch flavor to South Beach. I handled some of the prepwork (slicing a godforsaken amount of tomatoes) and helped out with serving during the event. A few hundred hungry burners later we managed to serve out everything and had a fantastic time doing so. That's the great thing about these festivals, the enire thing consists of the experiences people are willing to bring to everyone else. Some bring art, some bring sound, some just host awesome events. But it works because we are all here to contribue to the festival we want to have. Burner ethos says if you want to see something done, do it yourself!
Afterwards more exploring, got cleaned off at what is essentially a giant human car wash, rode the 1950's carosel that is part of the park, and explored more of the camps. There are always cool events and workshops that go on during the day, I just never seem to make it to them because there just so make distractions to have fun with.
As night came it was again time for nap and rally. Woke up, made some delcious bacon dogs for us and a couple campmates. My fiance went to go spin her fire hoop at the conclave for the second night of burns, but unfortunately we go stuck cleaning-up dinner and missed her. That was a bummer, but she performed later at a few of the other fire circles that formed. Sadly no videos. Afterwards we headed back to camp to drop her stuff off and get ready for exploring the rest of the evening. This time we went towards the other side of the burn and found the raviest stage there playing some awesome Drum and Bass. Really what ends up happening is any time we hear good music we just immediately head to that stage. We're not big on the deep house that is so prevalent at a lot of the camps so any time we get our music it's a treat we don't pass up.
Other fun highlights from Saturday were getting a night view from the ferris wheel. Climbing to the top of the giant globe and finding some raver kid with a giant speaker on his back. We took over the world with bass music. Managing to get a giant cargo net over one of the dance floor to ourselves. Random night time playground madness. Finding a camp with a bunch of candy out with a sign that said "Eat for Unicorn Powers!" (totally worked).
Sunday was probably the nicest day there. The weather was supposed to have periods of rain for large parts but it miraculously stayed clear almost the whole time. Got to actually enjoy the beach a bit and hang out at the sound camps that were right on the beach. It's also pretty great some times to just chill and not do much. We celebrated our last night there by opening some champagne on the beach at sunset and enjoying the beautiful weather before we went back to winter. Afterwards we headed back to the effigies where they were supposed to all get burned. We were really excited to see that huge global go down in flames. Unfortunately though the winds really kicked up and the fire department felt they were too close to the trees to burn safely. So just some more fireworks and a smaller burn (still enjoyable)
The last night of a burn can be a little weird some times. A lot of camps start packing up and the weather report for Monday morning was looking fairly bad. As one of our campmates said "I am never dealing with a wet tent and a NYC apartment ever again." So a few people left early and some camps packed most of their non-essential stuff up. But there was still plenty of fun to be had and the more subdued feelings of the last night are great for reflecting and connecting with others. I was frankly pretty done by 2am the last night and we headed back to the skybar that was near our camp (a normal bar, but on scaffolding about 4 stories up!). We met someone there though who mentioned that the go-cart track was still going strong and there was almost no line, so we set off on our last adventure of the burn. Was definitely worth dragging my tired ass back out of camp for, drifting go-carts mixed with laser tag, how could I miss that?
We woke up early the next day and the weather report was still not looking great. So we went into overdrive to break down our tent. We must have done something to please the Burn Gods, but because we literally shut our last suitcase as the sky opened up. That was the only rain of the day though, we spent the rest of our time getting some delicious cuban food in Little Havana, checking out some of the art galleries there, and doing a walking tour of the art deco area of South Beach.
I have to say this might have been the best regional I've been to so far and it was an absolutely incredible experience. Can't wait to go back but we might have to skip next year since it will be right after our honeymoon and I'll be back in school. Can't be too mad for having to skip it because of that!