Last summer was the most epic summer ever. I did everything I set out to do, even though I planned almost none of it. I went to London, Paris, New York, Amsterdam, Vansterdam (my favorite!), Ireland, British Columbia, and all over California. But of all my travels, nothing compared to the fun I had stateside and in BC, at the festivals!

Lightning in a Bottle

The festival season started for me in May at Lightning in a Bottle (Santa Barbara). It's a green festival with a focus as much on sustainable living, eco-villages, permaculture, and renewable energy as it is art, sick music (Bassnectar, Freq Nasty, Bluetech, and Abai are but a few of those that impressed), vaudeville/cirque, and 2012. Of all the workshops, the only one I made it to was the monkey chanting–although one could say I unwittingly contributed to a discussion on solar energy... when I took my first solar hit!

LIB was an awesome kick-off to summer. With its Burning Man-influenced aesthetic, it brought together some of the most beautiful freaks I saw all summer, often fabulously costumed like otherworldly beings, or not costumed, just otherworldly beings! Either way, the vibes were so high that synchronicities, miracles, and puzzle-pieces falling into place were just the norm, as if our energy created a field in which heaven could happen. I felt like I was on LSD when I was not, and overheard other festival-goers saying the same. No wonder there were so many sightings of UFOs!

The strong burner influence was apparent in the abundance of surreal art. My favorite was a two-headed dragon lit up from the inside, with green lasers for eyes that shot into the sky and projected onto the clouds at night. I exhaled my hits into the laser beam and watched it become smoky and opaque, but someone among us happened to have crystals in his pocket. He held the quartz piece in the laser beam and the entire crystal (which is clear) was immediately illuminated and shining like a bright green sun! You could even see the rays radiating off it! But it had yet a trippier effect: It diverted the laser beam, allowing us to literally alter the trajectory of the laser and where it fell on the clouds!

The burner presence was also evident in the kind-hearted gift-giving culture of the festival. A trailer-turned-kitchen offered free vegan food, and everywhere I turned I was given herb brownies, ganja chocolates, or other trippy treats. Once, when we went to buy some pizza, we found that someone had just paid for 20 pizzas (at $8 a pie!) just to give them away! All he asked was that if we took a slice, we took one with us to give to someone else. Then he gave us three pizzas to give away!

The nights were cold, but we managed to stay warm dancing and sharing kind bud. My camp mate had a chillum that we packed with the super-dank Mendo purps I had been gifted with just before the festival. We passed it around in all the high-vibin' circles we gravitated to, and the smiles and laughter we generated kept us cozy. And I suppose it didn't hurt that we were neighbors with one who was brave enough to defy the no-fire rule and warm us with the fire he lit in his tipi.

There were elves there, too. I was introduced to one on the very first day. "Dragonfly?" he repeated upon learning my name. "Well, let me get you some dragonfly wings, then!" And he dashed into his trailer and emerged with the most epic wings I'd ever seen! I gasped when I saw how beautiful they were! Everyone did! He said he didn't mind if I flew around the festival in them for a while, and ended up letting me wear them the whole weekend. Everyone I met, I spread my wings and wrapped them in a dragonfly embrace. I wanted my own pair, but they're the kind of wings dragonflies have to save up for. I told the elf, whose name was Durian, that I would totally get a pair for my upcoming first Burning Man, but when I went to return them, he said, Why don't you just keep them, Dragonfly?

The last night of LIB, I recovered from dancing at Freq Nasty's set by cuddling with my snuggle buddy in his van. I woke the next morning with the sun in my eyes, my favorite way to wake, and said goodbye to the best welcome to summer ever. Now it was time to head east for the next party: Playa del Fuego–the East coast regional Burning Man!

Playa del Fuego

My first official Burning Man event, Playa del Fuego was set in an open field on land owned by Vietnam Veterans in Delaware. At first I was a little weirded out by the abundance of biker dudes on the scene and the gigantic military helicopter perched on a stand and bearing down on our camp. But it didn’t take long for me to be grateful for the opportunity to interact with types I normally don’t encounter. In no time, they were smoking me out and indulging me in conversations about psychedelia and spirituality, and I realized the helicopter had a red cross symbol on it, suddenly making it completely appropriate given that our camp, the Om Dome, which offered massage, reiki, yoga, and meditation space, was said to be the only camp set up specifically for the purposes of healing.

What images burned in my virgin eyes? ...Gnomes scurrying about. Sometimes I’d see them in the corner of my eye. I’d turn to look, but they were gone. They rushed the stage during a burlesque/vaudeville performance, and later I even found their home, Gnome Camp. ...Then there were the domes set up specifically to enhance the psychedelic experience (good lookin’ out, guys!). ...An early-morning Om Dome visit from the Amish, speaking what we could only assume was Pennsylvania Dutch, and offering us a breakfast of hard-boiled eggs. ...And since it wouldn’t be a burner event without fire, there were fire sculptures throughout the grounds that kept us warm and mesmerized, and fire-spinners whose talent was so immense, no one questioned them when they said their spinning created a consciousness....

Shambhala

Ah, Shambhala! No festival impressed me as much as Shambhala! The synchronicities were immense, almost everyone I met seemed to have an elevated consciousness, and exploring far-out ideas with the sizable population of super-galactivated elves present made me feel like I was at some sort of rainbow warrior jedi training! I saw a UFO, and cast a spell on a girl at her request; I found a magical, purple velvet cloak of invisibility that literally had my name on it, and I even met Jesus!

Shambhala definitely gets top honors for having the best greeting. Immediately upon our arrival, a rather imposing security guard asked us in a deep voice, “Do you have any drugs or weapons?” Then quickly added, “–It's okay if you have drugs.” Awesome! He reminded us that this was a no-alcohol event and told us to have a great time. Now that's the way you greet somebody!

Straightaway, we went exploring. We found three stages: a beautiful Beach stage, where Bluetech and Bassnectar would play, the Village stage, with a sign at the entrance that read, "Ewoks only!" and the Portal stage, organized mostly by the super-activated kids from BC's fabled Sunshine Coast, and whose opening ceremony felt like a cosmic ceremony for the Galactic Federation! The property itself was mystical. Nestled in the valley between majestic mountains that hold crystals inside them, there was an enchanted forest, which was transformed into the Fractal Forest for the festival, complete with bridges that once were fallen trees, and paths and trails to explore, that all led back to one stage or another, so you could never get lost. Handy, since most of us were navigating in multiple dimensions!

It was a fabulous weekend for a festival: Earth was in the middle of an intense meteor shower, and every night I saw about a dozen shooting stars–while holding hands with Jesus! But there was something more in the sky that weekend. On Sunday night, several of us–having ingested no hallucinogens–witnessed a UFO, which we watched for well over an hour. The next day, we learned that there were UFO sightings reported all over the festival! It seemed only fitting, as Shambhala really was out of this world! Workshop topics included crop circles, the Mayan calendar, and using festival culture to usher in the next level of evolution of human consciousness. I felt like simply being in that environment activated my DNA!

The vast majority of the festival-goers were spiritual (r)evolutionaries–one beautiful, smiling goddess made eye contact with me as she passed by, extended her arms and beamed, “Thank you for being!”–but every party has its share of people who are only there to get wasted. At one point, I returned to my vehicle for warmer clothes, and found a very tense and very wasted human leaning against the door, wobbly and slurring his speech, while his friends tried to coax him into leaving with them. While I contemplated whether or not to interrupt by getting my jacket, he lunged at the guy in front of him, nailing him right in the nose! Their friends rushed over, saying to me, "It's okay, he just ate too many mushrooms." Oh? "Looks to me like maybe he could *use* some mushrooms," I said under my breath before retrieving my jacket. No wonder they call this festival Shambles!

Burning Man

The total lunar eclipse, flanked by shooting stars, behind me; the man burning on night one, framed by a surreal rainbow of water, in front of me... A UFO, noticed by me and witnessed by several other people, that circled over the playa... Raging dust storms that sent metal poles flying into the sky and several of us flying high, hittin’ bongs under safe cover of the RV I traveled in. Intense heat that couldn’t match the out-of-this-world hotness of the intellectually advanced beings the Universe gave to me for playmates. (One had the hottest chest I had ever seen in person, ever! And so did the next one!)... Waking up on art cars next to boys who are still cute in daylight... Unexpectedly bumping into and then quite predictably making out with one of the most beautiful men I have ever seen on Earth, whom I met at the Lightning in a Bottle festival but couldn’t kiss then because he had a girlfriend–and then making up for it on a fire-breathing dragon art car! Such was the introduction to my virgin Burning Man experience.

I spent my days lounging on the backs of tandem bikes pedaled by playa buddies old and new, some I will never forget and some, of course, I will never remember. I reconnected with friends and loves from festivals past, interacted with some of the most mind-blowing art I’ve ever seen (the piece titled “Tree of Life” blew us all away), stood in the breeze on the open playa and let blow my epic wings, and talked to God in a phone box. (God: “Jesus is coming. Pack the bong.” Me: “Um, Jesus is already here, Bro. I just made out with him at Shambhala. Like, shouldn’t you know that already? But don’t worry; I’m packing the bong regardless!”)

Burning Man at night is like an intergalactic, post-apocalyptic, psychedelic playground! Many beings looked like nothing I'd ever before seen. If they were Earthlings, it wasn't so easy to tell. There was everything you could never imagine riding by or floating by or getting high right next to you. Everyone was glowing or flaming or blinking with LEDs, illuminating what was otherwise a pitch black desert night. Thousands of people transformed into a glow, radiating with only the light they shined. With almost 50,000 attendees (many of whom were seen sky-diving in), Burning Man is one of the biggest parties on Earth, so it should come as no surprise that, yet again, UFOs came to check the scene!

Everything was so surreal... like sitting in the RV sharing warm hugs and good drugs with anyone who sought cover from the dramatic and beautiful dust storm that reduced the miles-and-miles visibility to about 2 feet out one side of the vehicle, while two guys played hockey in the bright sunshine on the other, shielded by the RV and seemingly a world away from the storm wreaking havoc just on the other side. Surreal... like seeing hardcore burners bike through the swirling dust, goggles and gas masks on, while poles and tents and debris went flying in the 50-mph winds, so much like a post-apocalyptic Wizard of Oz. And later, the double rainbow–which magically appeared at the exact moment that the rainbow portal at Entheon Village was completed–reminded us that, indeed, we were not in Kansas anymore. I wasn't even sure we were in this dimension anymore!

I watched the man burn from high atop the Kundalini Express, a tricked-out school bus that had a full band playing on top–complete with a drum kit, guitar, bass, several singers, a keyboardist, and a dj–and, of course, inside, a bar. When it was time for the oil rig to burn, the explosion rocked us all, sending gasps through the crowd. I wasn't the only one to remark that most people who see explosions like that don’t live to tell about it. We felt the heat blast from hundreds of yards away!

While burn night was in every regard the most epic, the night I spent with my two goddess sisters turned out to be one of the most fabulous nights not just of the burn, but of the entire summer! We biked across the playa smiling and giggling, dancing and hopping from art car to art car–the double-decker party bus and purple party bus were two favorites–and floated around on a cloud (literally! An art car that was a big, fluffy, cloud!). We took some purple urkel puffs and made our own big clouds. An upside-down cow rode by, and a massive boom-box with people dancing on top blaring house music followed. We heard some old-school reggae playing on one art car, so hopped on and began to slowly grind our hips to the music. People slowed to watch us pass as we laughingly took orders from the woman in charge–a pole-dance drill sergeant! She ordered us to "work those poles, girls! Is that the way you'd treat a cock?! Work it!" And to my friend (who was dressed in such a rainbow of fur that when I first saw her in it, I had demanded to know, "How many muppets had to die for you to wear that outfit?!"), she ordered, "Work that pole, furry ass! C'mon! I'm gonna show you how real women make money!" It was high-larious and we doubled over with laughter as other kids ditched their bikes and jumped on to join us.

Ah, Burning Man... We felt like super heroes on hiatus from Sesame Street, and this was our new home, a psychedelic trip circus full of other freaks who escaped the mundane world and were happy. I saw angels there, and devils, too, and gods and goddess of every hue, and faeries and elves with glowing wings and glittery eyelashes, that I recognized from parties past, or lifetimes past, or daydreams...

Earthdance

Successfully deflowered, my next stop was Earthdance, in Laytonville, CA. It was magic from the start: I showed up with no ticket and no money to buy one and ended up rather immediately with a backstage pass. Held on land owned by Wavy Gravy, the festival drew crowds that were old enough to actually know who Wavy Gravy was, and young enough not to care. I smelled a lot of DMT being smoked, by people who called it “deemsters,” both of which I thought were a little... strange, but whatever. There was not as much of an effort to use the body to create an image, as compared with Shambhala, LIB, and Burning Man. I was the only girl I saw go topless, and elaborate costumes like the playa wear I’d grown accustomed to were sparse.

There was a strong element of super-galactivated elves and faeries, though, dressed in what I would expect to see on planets light-years ahead of us. But all in all, it was a rootsier event, with full-on bands and jam sessions–although the electronic music tent did not disappoint! Some of the musical highlights were Third Eye Tribe, Zap Mama, and the Goddess Alchemy Project. The vaudeville performance by the Yard Dogs was top-notch entertainment, and the Mythmaker crew was there en force, as elaborately masked giants on stilts, towering over us and adding an element of surrealism and surprise.

Symbiosis

I had expected Earthdance to be my last summer festival... but then I got invited to Symbiosis. Good thing, too–Symbiosis ranked second only to Shambhala, and even that is a close call. Although Shambles dwarfs Symbiosis in population–10,000 compared with about 2,000–the same community of elevated beings who are all on some level preparing for an anticipated shift in human consciousness populated the event. The entire festival was run on solar power, and there were ample vegan and organic food options. Musically, I found Symbiosis to be the perfect combination of Shambhala’s and Earthdance’s finer points. While Shambles was an electronic music festival and Earthdance had a rootsier, jam band feel, Symbiosis brought us electronic jam bands! Zilla’s electronic mind-warp was phenomenal, and the improvised jam of the Symbiotic Orchestra (with featured Steve Kimock on guitar and guest appearances by Sasha Butterfly, Tina Malia, the Goddess Alchemy Project, and other festival circuit favorites) alone almost made this festival my favorite.

If LIB was the most epic way to start the summer, Symbiosis was the perfect way to end it. With an autumn equinox prayerformance happening just down the hill, I welcomed the new season around a bonfire, just having kissed goodbye the best summer ever with one last romp at Bassnectar’s set. The summer festival season ended the way it began: with a soak in some magical hot springs in Northern California. But the end of the season didn’t mean the end of the parties! The weekend after, I attended San Francisco's Love Fest, followed by Decompression parties (official post-Burning Man events) in S.F. and L.A. By now, I recognized half the party from festivals. Practically everyone I met was already a friend, someone I’d kissed in the sun, danced with under the moon, or at the very least, smoked some super dank herb with around a fire. The festival-goers had become my community. One big, high and happy, dancing and creative festival family, all making plans to come back and do it again next year!

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