FOMO: Fatigue in Black Rock City

January 1, 2015

Did you ever get the feeling that somewhere just out of your field of vision, something amazing was happening, perhaps in a parallel universe only just out of reach? That's basically how everyone's Facebook experience felt this August in the days after Burning Man, when the pop-up city/festival/ritual that occurs each summer deep in the Nevada hinterlands went totally viral. Burning Man is the event, but Black Rock City is the place, and its going mainstream in a big way. It's created from scratch every year, and there's a lot to know to access this most ethereal of hubs.

Access

Depending on your tolerance for pain, there are several methods for entering and exiting Black Rock City and Burning Man. First, you need a ticket, which are increasingly tough to come by and require diligent vigilance at Burning Man.com when they first go on sale in February. Blink and you'll miss it, requiring some fancy foot-work or higher levels of expenditure later. Tickets start at $380 and sometimes top $1000 depending on your luck.

If you're happy camping on your own and bringing all matter of everything on your back for the week, you'll fit right in winging it on arrivals. If you're too old for all that, then you need to be part of a camp, which are often part of theme camps or villages, which take care of some of the basics. An RV also helps, which can be parked at the camp and becomes a kind of refuge for all manner of activity, including hiding from gritty sandstorms that appear from all directions at zero notice.

(Please see our "Also See" section to the right for the full PDF of this article.)