Crossing Nevada on Interstate 80 is hypnotic. Unlike the Colorado Plateau, the landscape is devoid of exits, travel plazas, and otherworldly geography like the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon or Slickrock of Moab. Instead there are dark looming mountains in the distance separated by vast stretches of inhospitable dry alkaline lake beds. If it feels like you’re on a road to nowhere, you are.
People come this way because they want to do something in secret, or something dangerous, or something secretly dangerous. The government flies aircraft they don’t want anyone to see. Adrenaline freaks race cars at the speed of sound down endless stretches of salted sand. Aliens have a subdivision of starter homes. You have to have a really good reason for trying to live here or just plain dislike crowds. And there’s the appeal.
We headed for the alkaline flattop in northwest Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, made famous by the annual counter-culture artistic expressionistic gathering called Burning Man. During one week in August, 100,000 people form a city on the dry lake bed and celebrate individualism, or artistic communalism, or instagram influencerism – take your choice. We did not come out to the wastelands of Northern Nevada to hang out with 100,000 people, but we were interested in what motivates Burning Man participants to trek to the most remote and inaccessible area of the country; besides the free love and drugs of course. Perhaps we knew the answer all along.
Gerlach is gateway to the Black Rock desert, where a rag tag group of artists, dishwashers, short order cooks and tow truck operators live as far from civilization as they can manage. A single pump expels 87 octane at a crazy high price that we are happy to pay. Trevor hangs giant artwork for the Friends of the Black Rock Desert non-profit and washes up the dishes from your lunch at Bruno’s Cafe (and bar and museum). John owns Planet X, an oasis of solar powered shed galleries housing high end, high design pottery. It is the kind of gritty, friendly, quirky town where we would love to hang out. Most folks here began with that idea and just never left. We left.
Ten miles north of town we pick up the Soldier Meadows dirt road spur that parallels the massive main desert attraction, aka The Playa. A few days ago the area got two of its six inches of annual rainfall and The Playa is treacherous. You can drive across it until you can’t, at which point your vehicle is consumed by the moist surface. The postmaster, bartender, Public Works supervisor, and other concerned citizens eating lunch at Bruno’s warn us that two tourists are trapped out on the Playa as we speak – so use caution. We exercise the ultimate in caution by staying the heck off of it.
Instead, we pick up the 4WD road that ascends from the Playa surface up into the ridge structure surrounding the lake to do what we have yet to do this trip – live totally off-grid. There is no water nor electricity, no showers nor toilets, no shelter nor comfort of any kind except that which we have brought in the bed of the truck. On a grand view outcropping 500 feet above the Playa, we pitch camp in the stiff winds coming up the slope from the desert beach. The goal is not so much to survive but to do better than that. Enjoy good food. Sleep under the darkest of skies. Make art. Read books. Feel a world that has no other persons or services within 10 miles.
If we are fortunate, we will do just that for a brief period of time. It is a little like ascending to summit. Once you are on the summit you are already planning your descent. Perched on the edge of an iconic dry lake bed clinging to existence is our summit. We know we will not be here long but for the moment we savor the view. Finally away from State Parks, National monuments and other camping areas that have rules, we are living rule free which means we will celebrate our own Burning Man. Except, our Burning Man will be the bundle of firewood that we purchased in Colorado two weeks ago and have yet to be “allowed” to burn. We will burn it down tonight!
