My Los Angeles friend, Mike, that we camp with at Art Model Camp at Burning Man had mentioned wanting to go to Wasteland Weekend. The festival used to be called Mad Max weekend as it it mostly based on those films.

Travel – Getting to Wasteland Weekend

Getting places isn’t the problem. Getting to the ferry is. I hadn’t emptied the RV since my trip with Rover, Anne-Marie, and Hugo to Alberta. Since Andrew’s allergic to dogs this wasn’t a good start to a long road trip. I used my pet Dysen vacuum cleaner to remove a layer of dust and lost dog food. Then I used the small hand held carpet cleaner that Hannah’s mother was lending us.

Nature

I’ll admit it. We were scared of the possible creepy crawlies of the Mojave Desert. The good thing about Burning Man is that the Playa is mostly devoid of life. A few dormant shrimp but not much else. There could be the terrifying three Ss of the wilderness; Snakes – Scorpions- Spiders. Some rattlesnakes no longer rattle. Scorpions with the biggest tails do the least damage. We were told not to stomp on the lovelorn tarantulas as it was their mating season.

In reality all I saw was a black stink bug that was outside until it decided to take up residence on my bed inside the RV. I was nice and lifted him back outdoors. The other thing I saw was a small lizard.

Art

Even before the event, I was following the going-ons of a tribe called CimotA. They created what they called a “hovel” within Wasteland City next to the Rustinationists. We had met the neighbouring tribe at the Weed, California Rest Area when they were heading down from Seattle.

Yaga from CimotA created a lovely Tarot of the Wastes deck. The 25 High Arcana cards are done and the Low Arcana ones will be completed before next year’s Wasteland Weekend. She let me interview her about her deck.

Insert YouTube video here.

I was sitting at our camp and saw this horse being ridden down the road.

Lord Byron let me interview him about his mechanical horse named Forest.

Insert YouTube video here.

Car Cruise

There were about 26 vehicles in the car cruise. Wastelanders modify their cars to fit into the Mad Max aesthetic.

People wandered around before the cruise started.

I saw this accordionist heading towards the waiting cars. He sparked my interest because my mother plays accordion. I wondered how well the wax in the bellows was fairing in the desert heat though.

The one above is from the Engineers of the Apocalypse.

Barter

There were a couple of threads on Facebook asking Canadians to bring junk food south. I only managed to meet two of my recipients for Smarties and Coffee Crisp. One of them was Firebird.

 

Firebird is an interesting character and he agreed to an interview.

The other was Honey from Uncle Zeke’s Pit Stop (verify)

Insert YouTube video here.

Music

The main stage had many different types of shows throughout the five days. I really enjoyed the drag show which had driving music, good dance moves, and terrific costumes including Immortan Joe. Dublin Rain was a very large celtic band that had the lead singer and fiddler singing a tribute to Wasteland Weekend.

Travel – Homeward Bound

Christine was up for some touring around after the event but then she became worried about leaving her cats alone. Big Sur had had a mud slide so Highway 1 was shut there. Wild fires were still ranging along the Oregon coast. We decided to just go up the I-5. We took the I-99 north from the Mojave to Sacramento.

Summary

We’ll be back next year with a fully themed camp.