At night, Burning Man comes alive. Flame shows, shining mirrors, fields of lighted balloons, and a whirlwind of cars and people highlighted in purple, blue, green, yellow, white and orange.
A field of balloons...
A blue and white tree of hopes ...
The wheel of an art car and a night show ...(thanks to Sabine for these two shots)
Camps encourage participation -- jump on the trampoline, skate at the roller disco, balance the ropes course, fly, roll in a huge plastic ball and zoom down the slip-n-slide.
(Our camps slip-n-slide, fun on the trampoline, hoola-hooping it)
The art is interactive -- to touch, to manipulate, to climb.
(My climb to the top of the rocket.)
And there is music everywhere -- dance, dance and dance some more.
(A view of 'The Deep End' club across the street as seen from our camp. Dancing nearly 24 x 7)
The Black Rock dust storms lend a certain surreal feeling to Burning Man. They may come as tall, opaque tornados that swirl in, swallow up people, then pass quickly by, as wide walls that wash through like a wave, or as persistent and unrelenting storms.
On my second day I was caught far out of range of the campsites in a storm that lasted over an hour. With less than 20 feet of visibility, navigating back wasn't possible. Lesson learned: carry a mask, goggles, and extra water at all times!
(In order: Approaching dust storm, Dust storm arrived!, a dust tornado as seen from afar)
Some of the amazing structures to be found across the desert in Burning Man
Timothy Burton-style tree house. A dust storm brings a taste of the surreal.
Tree of Bones - moves slowly around the city on wheels. This shot has Burning Man in the background. 
Big rig doing a back bend. Touch it. Climb in it. DJs would gather around this at nighttime, spinning dark club music to an audience of dancers.
The ping pong structure. People openly 'ahh'ed' when the lights flash on at night.
Take a bike and ride in the Black Rock desert. These are just a few things you'd find.
Burning Man is an annual gathering of over 40,000 people out on a dusty Nevada desert floor as...
"an experiment in community, radical self-expression, and radical self-reliance."
In my four days there, I would describe it as Dr. Seuss meets ** Mad Max meets ** Timothy Burton creation meets **Circ du Soleil'.
It's a place where incredible artists come together to create art we can....
...see
....touch
..... interact with, climb on, climb through... experience........
The art is given dimension by DJs who amplify the art with a driving sound that stretches from one edge of the city to the other.
The art comes in the form of immense and serious structures to light whimsical pieces we nearly trip upon in our wanderings, to the participants themselves in their glowing costumes, and colors of neon orange, green, blue, red, and flashing yellows.
In the next few posts, I'll share a handful of pictures that show some of those great elements of Burning Man.
It’s 11:30 pm and we’re sitting cross-legged on the cold ground in the middle of a salt flat in Nevada. An emergency siren sounds off…1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 times. A hazy smoke spreads across the ground. Then fireworks shoot up into the air… over and over, lighting up all the faces around us… then silence.
All the faces around us look up with expectation.
Then comes a massive explosion. As far away as we are from it, we feel an intense heat on our faces as a fireball shoots out of a tower far into the air above it, forming into a massive mushroom cloud of flame. As the cloud dissipates, jets of flame shoot out of the ground with such intensity that a loud whistling sound follows. The jets of fire finally quiet and the remains of the tower burn slowly away. This is Burning Man - a gathering of over 40,000 people in a Nevada desert - and this was our final activity prior to leaving yesterday. More pictures and stories of my 4 days at Burning Man to follow!
(Pre-explosion fireworks with 2 safety personnel in the foreground.)
(The Mushroom Cloud. For scale, note the tower is over 6 stories tall! The fireball was created from salvaged jet fuel)
(The crowd lit up by the fireball.)
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