Another Home Away From Home

We headed North, dreaming of green grass and fresh air. We stumbled into Bend OR into the waiting arms of three of our dearest friends after almost twelve hours of traveling. Mel and her husband Gabe and their two year old Leo greeted us warmly. After hot showers, a meal and being entertained by their son we gratefully spilled into their guest bed. We spent the next three days being fed amazing cuisine (scrumptious Thai) wonderful company and having lots of laughs. After leaving such an amazing community during Burning Man we could not imagine a better family to decompress with.

I of course got my first of many baby fixes and totally fell in love with Leo. I mean come on, with that smile, those curls, and that personality who wouldn't love him! Josh tried not to be too jealous as he and Gabe talked music shop, and Mel and I gushed about the upcoming nuptials of Josh and I. It was nice to see some of our chosen family again.

During one day in sunny Bend ("it never rains here" to quote Gabe, and this only hours before an torrential hail, rain and thunder storm) we pulled EVERYTHING out of the RV to do a super clean. We knew it was time when Leo (who is still mastering the art of speaking) declared "Dirty!" when I brought him into the RV for a tour. During the deep clean, Mel's sister Dara, who owns an awesome salon literally across the street, offered to give me a cut. I had mentioned to Mel the day before that I was in need of a trim and her sister happily obliged. Besides I was looking for an excuse to get my hands of of the now gray soapy water that I had been scrubbing the floor with. One needs to look HOT when covered in playa dust from head to toe.

After the deep clean and the trim, Gabe had to dash to a rehearsal, so Mel, Josh, Dara, her daughter Veda and I went to a happening Mexican Restaurant and ate WAY TOO MUCH! It was delicious and the pitcher of margarita's washed everything down perfectly. If anyone is ever looking for good eats, they should book a flight to Bend and look up Gabe and Mel who were a wealth of restaurant knowledge.

Josh and I managed to pull Gabe away from work one morning, we headed to an amazing little place for breakfast/lunch. we sat outside in the sun surrounded by beautiful blooms and a very sweet man made stream. Once we ate our fill we took a very scenic drive to the top of Pilot Butte and marvled at the amazing scenery. We certainly don't have mountains like THAT on the east coast!

It was sad to leave, Bend was as beautiful as we had imagined and we will always look forward to visiting our good friends there.

So, How Was It?

How was burning man? This has been, without a shadow of a doubt, the question I've heard more than any over the last two weeks.

Burning Man Sucked! Burning Man was Incredible! It was happy & sad; stressful & relaxing; exciting & boring; old & new. This year, it was even hot & cold, rainy & sunny, windy & still.

I think that about sums up Burning Man for me. It's a year's worth of emotion, experience, love, hate, joy and sorrow wrapped into one hell of an intense week. Was it more "green" than usual? Not really.

This year couldn't have had a rougher emotional beginning. At the greeter gate, every year whether it's your first or hundredth, you are greeted with a warm "Welcome Home" which is generally followed by at least some hugs, and at most, some nude "dust angles" (never done it myself, but it's a snow angle with pizzaz). As Lindsay and I bumped our way down the entrance road, alongside thousands faces that were familiar not because we recognized the features, but because we recognized the look they were wearing, we had a long discussion about how much this year really did feel like coming home. After living everywhere and nowhere for 2 months, driving down a familiar dirt road surrounded by our old community was a warm and welcome feeling.

The shock of Lindsay's face and the cold stare of that nasty woman who was "just doing her job" who took our plants snapped that warm feeling clean in two. All of the sudden, home wasn't so homey. We had been robbed, not just of our lovely houseplants, but of the trusting, open feeling one gets when returning home.

Thankfully, and most necessarily, our actual "greeter" was warm, friendly to the point of tears in the corner of his smiling eyes, and so happy to share the excitement of the thousands of people he had probably greeted that day. It was enough to at least remind us why we were here.

Upon arriving, we spent a good 1/2 hour just putting around with our big ole' home, trying mostly to find a spot to park, but also taking advantage of this one opportunity we'd have to drive around the Playa and take it in.

We ended up pulling into a great spot, filling in a hole around a nice little common area some other people had made. We introduced ourselves, and through weary (they had been out until sunrise the night before) eyes they welcomed us to their neighborhood.

Lindsay and I spent most of the rest of the day building our mini-dome, a place that would provide us respite from the sun so we could leave the RV locked down during the days, and a place that would later become a wonderful little gathering spot. Through the coming days, most of our neighbors' shade structures we completely destroyed by the wind.

After a quick dinner, we indulged in a bike ride around the city, taking it all in, talking about where we'd like to come back to, what we'd like to do and experience. Seeing Center Camp again was magical. Consuming the beauty of all of these people in their Burning Man best filled me right up. But the surge I felt as we first pulled our bikes into the open Playa is beyond description. I believe Linds referred to it as the "hum" and I can't think of a better word. Though, it's not just the sound, it's the energy in the air... it just fills you up.

The next couple of days, we spent our time lounging around with Kathy and Raspberry Truffle, two Seattleites that had come for their first time. They were a godsend. Not only because they were wonderful people to share the time with, but because they had planned (as we had) on sharing their food with the people around them - and their food was fantastic. We were soon joined by another group of neighbors from Santa Rosa. These guys were fun - here to party, and generally added a great up-energy dynamic to our little group.

Our nights were spent drinking a cup of coffee around 7 or 8pm, then maniacally navigating the city: drinking champagne with a very gay male cheerleader, listening to 4 musicians who'd never met jam out with full sound equipment (ick), taking in the nighttime art, watching a (somewhat disappointing) aerial dance performance, listening to incredible original music at center camp, smiling at passersby, zig-zagging from here to there to see this and that, and then finally coming to a slow down around 12:30 or 1am and making our way back to (again) our warm and comfortable bed.

I think it's time for a very deserved pause from the narrative to pay homage to some of the art we saw:

Giant scrap-metal figures praying (in different prayer poses from around the globe) to a 90 foot tall wooden oil derrick that people could climb the stairs to stand at the top. The meaning behind it was powerful, the sculpture was just perfect.

Two Oil Tankers, in a yin-yang vertical dance, teetering, but balanced gracefully.

A "Merry Go Round" of flying monkeys, powered by people on bikes, complete with strobe lights so that in the dark of night, the merry-go-round would go away, and all you would see were animated monkeys, swinging from limb to limb, being fed a red apple by a green snake with a hand for its head (yes, it was beyond description!)

Mini-Golf on the playa.

A quiet dome way out in the playa - where tea was served at sundown each evening.

And then, there was the temple....

I could list on and on and on, but it's probably better if you just click here and check it out.

Back to our narrative...

The arrival of Shiva and Nicole brought enough excitement to live up to the anticipation we had been feeling during the couple of days we spent without them. We had so much we wanted to show them, things we wanted to do with them, things we were ready to share. All in all, those thoughts vanished during our first walk out to The Man. We had waited for Shiva and Nicole to arrive before heading out there, we thought it would be a nice thing for us to all do together, and because the man was to be "closed off" Friday Night, we couldn't wait for better weather to arrive, so we went for it in the rain. Lindsay has done these moments all the justice they need. Double Rainbow in the Desert + Art + Happy People + Love + Loved Ones + Coming Home + Spontaneous Engagement = HOLY-SHIT-WOW!

It was all we needed, more than we had hoped for and everything we expected of Burning Man.

The Man itself, usually a shining example of interactive creativity, was really quite a let down this year, consisting mostly of a green-living expo that was really WAY out there. I'm not sure, but a Rocket Stove that can heat your house on just a bundle of sticks each day sounds very interesting, but dude, this is Burning Man, lay off the sales pitch!

During the course of our remaining couple of days, the most I really remember doing is enjoying the time with friends, eating, drinking and being merry. I know we went dancing and explored center camp some more (a week spent just doing center camp would probably be a great week). We attended the burning of the Man on Saturday night with Kathy and Raspberry Truffle, who made the observation we've felt in the past "Wow, you can just FEEL the energy in the air, it's amazing.", then returned to the safe confines of our trailer while they shot a 1000-foot propane fireball out of the Oil Derrick. The fireworks were amazing, and the excitement level was through the roof. After all of that, what really left a scar on my brain was Sunday.

Nicole and I are the kind of people who get satisfaction out of putting ourselves out there. Shiva and Lindsay, not so much. But through a group effort we devised a simple plan that turned into one of my favorite memories. Sunday Morning, Shiva cut up a watermelon that had been given to us in exchange for a plate of fresh from the oven cookies (yeah, people liked those a lot, almost as much as the freezy pops we had been doling out. The RV was a good thing.) and refrigerated it in small chunks. Nicole filled up our water mister and we set out in the early afternoon, the hottest part of the day, to do some do-godding.

The effect was immediate. People had been out all night, probably without enough water, probably doing god knows what to their body. Many of them had probably awakened just an hour or two earlier because it was too hot to stay passed out any longer, and they were now trudging their way back home to their tent. That's where some of them bumped into our 4 smiling faces "Would you like a slice of fresh Watermelon and a cool mist?"

Needless to say, our smiles were returned with the most thankful faces I have ever seen. Some people's hands were too dusty to stick into the watermelon bowl, so we would just feed them. Some people were so sunburned that the cool mist from the water sprayer was almost too much. But let me tell you. Not only is the cliche "It is better to give than to receive" one of the truest statements on earth. The feeling of being called an Angel or Godsend tops it all.

Feeling wonderful, we returned to camp and began the altogether frustrating practice of waiting for the sun to set a little so it would be cool enough for us to break down our camp. I got bored and went for a bike ride. Didn't do much, but I did find a slice of Playa unused enough to put my road bike in its highest gear and pedal as fast as I could. Fun!

Our cleanup process was a snap. 3 years of dome-development proved useful and the heavy duty zip-ties we had used to build everything just clipped off in a second. We were asked by a couple of Burning Man Rangers to help clean up after a some people that had ducked out on Saturday Night and left behind their wind-thrashed Home Depot garden tents.

With the assistance of a good amount of rope and grunting, Shiva and I were able to wrestle the twisted metal into a manageable-enough bunch that one of our neighbors, who was only driving to Reno, was able to take them home for disposal. Toward the end of our struggle, a very warm and happy woman asked shiva to pose for a couple of pictures in the sunset, and in return presented he and I with a Cleu. A wonderful piece of neckwear representing "You, The Earth, Your Consciousness and The Universe." A touching gift that felt like an instant-karma reward for the work we had just done.

Exhausted, the four of us donned our white robes (courtesy, Burning Man 2005) and set off to joined the rest of the community for the procession to the temple burn. This year's Temple was an exquisitely detailed, Zen-inspired wooden tower that had become an emotional idol for so much of the community (for more on this, see Lindsay's blog). In contrast to our 2005 experience, we were surrounded by somber, respectful, and emotionally connected people who shared with us the power of the moment as someone sang "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (a tribute to Nicole & Shiva?) before the fire was lit, followed by "Redemption Song" as they lit the flames. The fire creeping at the feet of this magnificent temple, as people around us sobbed, smiled, held hands and swayed, some of us singing along quietly, was a more spiritual prayer experience than any I have ever been a part of.

As the flames crept further up the desert-dried wooden structure, cracking and popping, emotions swelled around the circle of what was probably 20-25,000 people at that point. Spontaneously, the wave began... but not the cheesy, arms in the air wave that you've seen at the ball game. This was a wave of sound. People screaming and yelling, releasing angst or sharing joy, I don't know. But the swell of sound and energy swirling around a circle of people all focusing on a fire more beautiful than can be described was something I'm proud to have been a part of.

The next morning, well before sunrise, we bid farewell to Shiva & Nicole as they joined the already long exodus processional. A couple of hours later, Lindsay and I drove our rig into the now teeming line of cars, to creep our way off the playa. The sun came up, and as we looked around at all of the familiar faces, we knew this would probably be our last burn. But what a good one it was!

The Burn!

We left Winnemucca UT around noon and headed toward the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. As we drove we noticed more and more vehicles loaded with bikes, boxes of costumes, food and smiling faces. We knew who each other were and we knew we where we were heading. We got a good healthy dose of community before we even got to Burning Man.

We wound our way through the tiny towns of Empire and Gerlach, being joined all the time by more and more cars, vans, and RV's. We did feel a little sheepish this year for two reasons. The first two times we went to Burning Man, we were there there for the whole week and scoffed at the "weekenders", the folks who come out to the desert for the big end of the week celebration. This year we were joining them on Wednesday, a full three days after the festival had started. The second reason we felt guilty was because of the home that we were towing behind us. In previous years we roughed it with only tents for sleeping, and a shade dome that kept the sun at bay but never did much when the big dust storms came though. Oh well, we did Burning Man this year the cushy way.

We drove onto the playa listening to BMIR (Burning Man Independent Radio) laughing at the adds to remind you to drink water and watch your mouth around the youngsters that would be attending. Everything went smoothly, we got our tickets at will call and headed to the first of two gates that we had to pass through before we made our way "home". At the first gate we had the unpleasant experience of having Boris and Natasha, two of our three houseplants, taken away. The girl was rude and didn't care that she was searching our home, spreading dust on our bed as she rummaged through closets and under the couch. She told me that Boris and Natasha would be donated to the town (I hope she was right). Pip squeak (who was hanging in that bathroom) failed to draw her attention so he is our Burning Man survivor and now hangs happily in one of our windows.

Needless to say she did not get the Utah peach I had in my hand as a gift to her.
We went through the second gate where the real greeters were. We both gave them hugs and handed out peaches.

We found a patch of desert near 5:55 and Intertidal. After we parked, set up the dome, and made dinner we went around to meet our neighbors. All the them (with a few exceptions) were Burning Man virgins so we felt very proud to be giving advice.

We set our on our first night on our bikes (another Burning Man first for us) and met wonderful friends and found wonderful art. This metal man was a part of a much larger piece of work, but his pose and demeanor was one of my favorites.

For anyone who has never seen Burning Man at night, picture an amusement park, all lit up. Strobes, neon, strange glows coming from the horizon, then multiply it by one hundred. The lights and shapes are so vibrant they make your eyes water. Now imagine the sounds, music thumping from cars decked out to the max with fur, feathers, grinning people who have hopped on for the ride. Imagine distant sounds of cheers coming from the Thunderdome, imagine sweet swirls of acoustic sitar from a nearby, dimly lit dome, screams of delight, purrs of recognition, whispers between loved ones, all of this mixed and mashed up in one cacophony that is the HUM at Burning Man. The hum never disappears completely, it changes decibels but it is always there.

We rode around open-mouthed, loving every minute of it, and when we got tired, we rode home, unlocked the door to our home and crawled into our very own bed. Ahhh, the joys of having an RV on the playa.

For the next few days we followed a rigorous schedule of sitting in the shade with our new friends, drinking coffee, and laughing. Then as the sun slowly encroached on our cool shade we made plans for the day. Sometimes we would hop on our bikes and head out to the big art far out on the horizon, sometimes we would try to find an event at a nearby camp, sometimes it was simply nap time again. Your days at Burning Man tend to follow creature comforts. You take care of your body, because when you are in 100+ degrees with whipping wind and dust you need to make sure you don't get dehydrated, or hungry or tired.

On Friday our good friends Nicole and Shiva arrived. In past years they would be the contingent to drive all of our big supplies from L.A. while Josh and I had to fly in to Reno, rent a car and drive all of our supplies out to the playa to meet them. On this day however, they pulled right up, and joined us in the RV while a particularly nasty dust storm rolled through.
After the storm passed we all decked ourselves out in our Burning Man best and headed out to see the man.

We opened the door to the RV to a much cooler desert. The dust storm had brought through a front. The sky had been swept clear except for dark, menacing storm clouds the were hugging the tops of the mountains along the horizon. The four of us headed toward the man. As we got closer to the man a light rain began to fall. After three years going to Burning Man I had never felt rain. We ran and laughed as the cold pinpricks of rain left clean spots of skin through the coating of dust that you wear while on the playa. We had come into view of the man who stood majestically against the contrasting blues of the sky. The man was perfectly outlined by the two most perfect rainbows arching exactly over him. We could see exactly where they began and ended smack on the playa. We all began laughing and running toward the man. Others had noticed the multicolored spectacle and joined us in our reverie. It was such an amazing and powerful moment. Shiva grabbed Nicole's hand and with emotion in his throat asked her if she would marry him. She replied without a moments hesitation that she would. Josh and I looked at each other unsure if the beautiful moment had just happened. As they kissed and held each other we saw the love that they have for each other and we joined them in their engagement celebration.

The rest of the time we spent at Burning Man was wonderful. We made even more new friends, we saw even more art and we soaked up the wonderful vibe of community that we all enjoy being a part of.

The man burned, for the second time, on Saturday night. Unfortunately, on the Tuesday before someone decided to take it upon himself to commit a little arson and attempted to burn the man down early. The Burning Man community rallied and the man was repaired and in place ready for the burn on Saturday. We stayed for the Temple burn on Sunday which is a much more somber celebration. Earlier in the week Josh and I had gone out to the temple and found some of the most amazing energy. In the past the temple has stood as a place for people to mourn lost friends and family, forgive themselves or others, and be a safe place for people to reflect, celebrate and mourn. This year was no different.

For myself, the first year I went to Burning Man my Mom's father, my Popa, was having a biopsy of the Melonoma that had been found on the top of his head. The day that he went in for this procedure Josh and I spent some good time at the HeeBeeGeeBee Healers Camp where I spoke with an amazing man named Donovan who asked me for a wish. I told him that I wanted my grandfather to make it over the hurdle of cancer. Donovan told me that he hoped my wish would come true but he also advised me to make a a place in my head for the fact that he may not get better. I had never had anyone speak so frankly to me about something so personal. I spent the rest of the day trying to balance these two thoughts, the wish for my Popa's health, and the realization that his good health may never return. My Popa lost his battle with cancer two years ago on September 21st. This year at Burning Man I wrote his name on the temple and when it burned I felt all the sadness I had felt just after he had died but I also felt that he would have enjoyed the power that this one amazing structure burning had for so many people.

We left the desert on Monday morning (along with about 20,000 other people) and as we stopped and started with the rest of the traffic we reflected on what we had seen, heard and done. I for one, have had a pretty good dose of Burning Man. I have put in and taken out of the experience exactly what I wanted. I could go again, but if I don't I know that what I experienced on the playa is something that I will always remember and cherish.

So now you have heard what Lindsay thought and felt during the Burn....now it is Josh's turn.

Salt Lake City, UT

We kept heading south with our most southern goal being Burning Man in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. We made a two day pit stop in Salt Lake City UT where there was a plethora of health food stores, Home Depots, and Army surplus stores where we could stock up on supplies for Burning Man. Needless to say, we were very busy for two days getting our errands done.

The highlights of UT:
A basket of the BEST peaches ever (bought from a roadside fruit stand).
No bears running through our camp.
Filling up on really great grease.
Getting most of our Burning Man supplies in one VERY productive day.

The not so highlights of UT:
Campground right next to the railroad tracks (although this is a trend that has continued).
Locking our keys in the car (with the car running) in the parking lot of Home Depot (the least productive part of our very productive day).
Trying to go swimming (UT was having a serious drought so the water was slimy and muddy at best).

All in all we left UT happy, with almost everything crossed off our list. We spent one more night off the playa in a tiny casino town called Winnemucca in NV where we were able to do some much needed work on the truck. The truck had been chugging to terribly while running on grease that we had almost completely given up on it. Josh talked to Ethan at Greasecar and the two of them decided that Josh should switch around the pump hoses, while doing this, Josh found a pine needle in one of the hoses. It may sound like a small thing but we think that the one pine needle could have been the root of the problem.

With a happy truck, a full refrigerator and pantry, and much excitement we headed out to the desert!

Grand Indeed!

Thoroughly jaded: Our thinking on anything regarding landscapes after being in Yellowstone.

Totally wrong. Our preconception of Grand Teton.

The two parks are connected by road and share a common border. You only have to buy one pass to visit both, so what could the big deal be? You pass through a little brown gate, and lo and behold... more pine trees!!!

So we continued driving south through the rolling hills, literally nonplussed by the landscape, but still reveling in the joy of our morning safari. We probably passed a deer or elk somewhere and slowed down just enough to point and smile. Then, around a bend somewhere, the towering majesty of the Teton range, spiking out of Jackson lake, came into view.

We pulled over.

It would be redundant of me to write an account of our reaction each time we saw the mountains, but it seemed that every time we drove past it, something was so magnificent that we would gasp or sigh and either pull over or swerve so badly that we should have. Whether it was perfect blue sky. Manicured clouds. Even the black-on-black of stone mountains breaking a night sky.

Early one afternoon enjoyed a picnic lunch in a secluded little spot on the bank of Jenny lake, where, from the rocky beach, we could see straight down to the bottom of the lake at least 30 or 40 feet out. It was that crystal clear. Generally, however, we were more distracted with the 9000 feet of rock rising out of the water. We were also thoroughly distracted by the MOST persistent little chipmunk I've ever seen. He was enough of a badger to turn any nature lover into a bloodthirsty murder.

Enduring the incredibly stressful drive down a 55 mph road literally teeming with elk and deer, we spent a little time in the city of Jackson Hole. We certainly enjoyed our respite at a wonderful little coffee shop, but we're over the tourist-hype at this point, so shopping for overpriced eccentricities wasn't high on our to-do list. We spent most of our time amongst the herds of Elk (dozens together) and Buffalo (we probably saw a hundred in one group, all crossing the street while we waited patiently) framed again by the mountain majesty.

Other close encounters with the animal kind included a bear being chased through our campsite by groundskeepers (Lindsay ran screaming - I would have done the same if I wasn't already in the truck), and a herd of deer plodding through another campground we stayed at.

The pictures clearly won't do this justice, but hey, worth a shot, right?

Water Water Everywhere

We sadly left Bozeman, it could be an amazing place to live, we knew that our good friend Luke was going to love it, and with him living here we knew that we had even more of a reason to come and visit.
So onward to Yellowstone Park we went, finding our way into the park from the north. Just before the north entrance Josh had found a white water rafting place that promised hilarious guides, lots of white water and amazing sightseeing along the Yellowstone River. I'm not going to lie, I was nervous. No, I was scared. I have never liked the feeling of being so out of control with the immensely strong force of nature that water is. Josh was so excited and I really didn't want to wimp out at the last minute so with a brave face I suited up in a wet suit, listened to the safety talk very carefully, and helped out guide, Carl, push our big yellow raft into the water ahead of the three other rafts that were joining us down the river.
The first rapids we hit felt HUGE, "All FORWARD!" yelled Carl and we dug our paddles in to the white swirling water. As soon as I felt our man power pull us through the first swells I realized that we weren't powerless to the water, we had control, and we had complete faith in our guide to tell us how to maintain that control. We bobbed through slow swells, got extremely soaked in larger white waves and whooped when the raft felt like a tiny toy in a huge whirlpool. I would do it again, I never thought I would feel that way.
The river wildlife was sparse, the fisherman were not. We saw a few Osprey, a Bald Eagle and an antelope rib cage bleached white by the sun. During a slower moment we chatted with the young couple sitting in front of us, we overheard them mention the hot springs they were going to visit later that day and through chattering teeth we invited ourselves along.
After a bumpy ride back to drop our rafts off we followed our new friends to the North entrance of Yellowstone and then to where the Boiling River meets the Gardiner river. The boiling river poured 130 degree water into a much cooler river, making pockets of hot water to soak in. We sat in the water until our teeth stopped chattering and our fingers were total prunes.
It was a nice way to end a very busy, exhausting day. We found a campground in Madison, a village inside of Yellowstone Park. We marveled at the amazing scenery the whole way to our campground and made a plan to get up with the sun to see the wildlife.
The next morning began with Buffalo munching breakfast in misty sage brush flats. We watched a massively antlered male Elk carefully calculate his path through the new growth of pines that had sprung up since the last forest fire, we admired the burps and plops of the mud paint pots and watched the crystal clear cascading of the many falls. It was a splendid morning. After we packed up we headed south to Grand Teton National park, we thought we'd be numb to amazing scenery but boy were we wrong. The Teton's took our breath away...