I know I should update, but I'm not entirely clear on what I want to say. How about some flashbacks instead...
End of August. Last year, Space Island built a ship of around 22 feet long with a crew of more than thirty over the span of six months. This year, a crew of less than ten was building a 40 foot ship in a month's time. My campmate Stefano and I were doing the majority of the work, mostly because we had the time.
We'd finished the steel work, and were now working on everything from the walls to decking to electrical work to lighting and sound systems to the gangplank and a thousand other little tasks. Building a space pirate ship isn't like working on a car, or building anything else for that matter. Everything we wanted to make had to be designed as well as built.
All of August had been hot, so Stefano and I had taken to working through the night and sleeping during the heat of the day (or using that time to make supply runs to steel yards or Home Depot). At night our campmates Tony, Pollo, and Keebler would join in, and help wrangle the rotating cast of friends who could give us a few hours time here and there.
Finally, after weeks of abusing our bodies, the ship was ready. Aside from sleep deprivation and physical strain, we'd picked up injuries along the way and of course had abused our fair share of substances (I made a policy to never work on a pirate ship sober, and can happily report that the policy was strictly enforced). So on the last Friday in August (technically Saturday morning), at 4:20am of all times, we set sail from Los Angeles bound for the Black Rock desert.
A hair under 40 feet long, 8'4" wide, and 13'2" high, the ship was just barely street legal. Getting out of Los Angeles under cover of darkness was key - it was quite a sight and we figured was likely to attract the attention of law enforcement should it be seen traveling through a major city.
We made it out of LA without incident. The ship was wobbling, though. Traveling in the chase car, the wobble appeared to be about 7 degrees from center. At 50 to 60 miles an hour, 7 degrees was some scary shit. A couple bad bounces looked like it was even further - I had visions of the ship going over on its side, spilling thousands of pounds of gear onto the highway.
Just as things started to smooth out, we noticed movement from above. In a flash, one of the storage bins packed on the upper deck lifted into the air and then crashed onto Interstate 5 North, spilling its contents.
In a long line of things you never thought you would ever hear someone say, this one takes the cake...
"We had to pull over to the side of the road and kick the disco ball that fell out of the pirate ship out from under Rafael's truck."
When the storage bin hit the highway, all its contents spilled out, including a good-sized mirror ball. The disco ball bounced along, then got itself caught under our friend Rafael's vehicle. It scraped and it sparked and generally freaked us the fuck out. Once we got the disco ball out and collected our caravan, we re-packed and secured the load and set off again.
The drive was uneventful until the day started to get hot. At that time, we were driving through the Mojave desert - and that's when Rafael's truck decided to take exception to the way it had been treated. The disco ball had apparently done some damage, and Rafa's transmission blew.
We partially unloaded the ship, and did what we could to load as much of the gear in his truck onto the ship as we could. He was hauling a lot of stuff for a big theme camp, as well as his own gear. We couldn't reach the organizers of the big camp, so we had to guess what things were being used for and prioritize it. We couldn't take everything - the ship was already overloaded and we were still concerned about that wobble.
An hour and a half in the hot sun later, and we set sail again. But at a much slower pace, for fear of blowing the ship's transmission. 15-35 miles an hour. But we were making it.
Our initial plan had been to make it to the playa before sunset. Instead it was nearly 11pm before we got as far as Carson City. We connected by phone to friends who were traveling separately, and gave them our grocery order - things we needed to pick up along the way to go with the food we had with us. We also needed to get water, which was a concern. The 200 or so gallons of water we needed would weigh over 1500 pounds, and we were already well over what the ship could handle comfortably. The people organizing the big theme camp had a crew pulling into Reno, and they said they could get our water and beer for us. All we needed to get was enough ice to last us three days.
Around 3:30am, 23 hours after we set out, we passed through the gates at Burning Man...
~Trilo~
End of August. Last year, Space Island built a ship of around 22 feet long with a crew of more than thirty over the span of six months. This year, a crew of less than ten was building a 40 foot ship in a month's time. My campmate Stefano and I were doing the majority of the work, mostly because we had the time.
We'd finished the steel work, and were now working on everything from the walls to decking to electrical work to lighting and sound systems to the gangplank and a thousand other little tasks. Building a space pirate ship isn't like working on a car, or building anything else for that matter. Everything we wanted to make had to be designed as well as built.
All of August had been hot, so Stefano and I had taken to working through the night and sleeping during the heat of the day (or using that time to make supply runs to steel yards or Home Depot). At night our campmates Tony, Pollo, and Keebler would join in, and help wrangle the rotating cast of friends who could give us a few hours time here and there.
Finally, after weeks of abusing our bodies, the ship was ready. Aside from sleep deprivation and physical strain, we'd picked up injuries along the way and of course had abused our fair share of substances (I made a policy to never work on a pirate ship sober, and can happily report that the policy was strictly enforced). So on the last Friday in August (technically Saturday morning), at 4:20am of all times, we set sail from Los Angeles bound for the Black Rock desert.
A hair under 40 feet long, 8'4" wide, and 13'2" high, the ship was just barely street legal. Getting out of Los Angeles under cover of darkness was key - it was quite a sight and we figured was likely to attract the attention of law enforcement should it be seen traveling through a major city.
We made it out of LA without incident. The ship was wobbling, though. Traveling in the chase car, the wobble appeared to be about 7 degrees from center. At 50 to 60 miles an hour, 7 degrees was some scary shit. A couple bad bounces looked like it was even further - I had visions of the ship going over on its side, spilling thousands of pounds of gear onto the highway.
Just as things started to smooth out, we noticed movement from above. In a flash, one of the storage bins packed on the upper deck lifted into the air and then crashed onto Interstate 5 North, spilling its contents.
In a long line of things you never thought you would ever hear someone say, this one takes the cake...
"We had to pull over to the side of the road and kick the disco ball that fell out of the pirate ship out from under Rafael's truck."
When the storage bin hit the highway, all its contents spilled out, including a good-sized mirror ball. The disco ball bounced along, then got itself caught under our friend Rafael's vehicle. It scraped and it sparked and generally freaked us the fuck out. Once we got the disco ball out and collected our caravan, we re-packed and secured the load and set off again.
The drive was uneventful until the day started to get hot. At that time, we were driving through the Mojave desert - and that's when Rafael's truck decided to take exception to the way it had been treated. The disco ball had apparently done some damage, and Rafa's transmission blew.
We partially unloaded the ship, and did what we could to load as much of the gear in his truck onto the ship as we could. He was hauling a lot of stuff for a big theme camp, as well as his own gear. We couldn't reach the organizers of the big camp, so we had to guess what things were being used for and prioritize it. We couldn't take everything - the ship was already overloaded and we were still concerned about that wobble.
An hour and a half in the hot sun later, and we set sail again. But at a much slower pace, for fear of blowing the ship's transmission. 15-35 miles an hour. But we were making it.
Our initial plan had been to make it to the playa before sunset. Instead it was nearly 11pm before we got as far as Carson City. We connected by phone to friends who were traveling separately, and gave them our grocery order - things we needed to pick up along the way to go with the food we had with us. We also needed to get water, which was a concern. The 200 or so gallons of water we needed would weigh over 1500 pounds, and we were already well over what the ship could handle comfortably. The people organizing the big theme camp had a crew pulling into Reno, and they said they could get our water and beer for us. All we needed to get was enough ice to last us three days.
Around 3:30am, 23 hours after we set out, we passed through the gates at Burning Man...
~Trilo~