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[If you’re not interested in Burning Man and its culture, you might want to skip this one.]

At the beginning of July, after spending a month in northern Europe, I pointed southward, destination: Nowhere.

The Nowhere Festival is an eight-year-old festival inspired by Burning Man, held in the Aragon desert of northern Spain. Many of you know that I’ve been attending Burning Man, Critical Massive (the WA state BM regional event) and similar BM-inspired events since 2000. I first heard about Nowhere around 2005, from a few of my friends in Europe who went early on, when there were around 200 attendees.

Due to my limited carrying capacity for the food, water and amenities necessary for a week-long festival, I put a few calls out to join a barrio (Nowhere-ese for theme camp) with a food plan. I was eagerly received into the Garden of Joy, a barrio organized by a lovely group of Italian Burners. I immediately felt at home on arrival, being warmly greeted by Maggie (who initially answered my call) and Marco, the camp’s organizer and “spiritual leader” for lack of a better term (most of the Italians affectionately refer to Marco as “Baba”, from Satya Sai Baba, the famous Hindu guru).

It could have just as easily been called the Garden of Decadence. There was a misting system installed in the common areas, keeping the temperature easily 5-10°C cooler than any other camp. An entire Jamon d’Iberico on the kitchen table, casually draped with a towel to keep flies off. Two refrigerators, electric and gas stoves, a thumping sound system, daily food deliveries from Sari?ena (the closest town), excellent meals, all the amenities a happy Burner might need.

Most of all, the Garden was home to an incredible group of people – Italian, French, Dutch, British, Spanish, American, Canadian, Kiwi and more – I was lucky to find such a welcoming home and wonderful company, many of whom I expect and hope to see again during my travels.

Official attendance this year was around 650 people, mostly folks who’d bought tickets in advance, but also a few locals who had heard about the event and came out to satisfy their curiosity.

Burners: if time and circumstance combine to present an opportunity to attend this event, I strongly recommend it. It was quite possibly my favorite burn yet – I think in large part because I knew basically nobody on arrival, so was immediately forced out of my comfort zone.

A few personal highlights and observations of the event (a few of these will only be meaningful to people who have camped with me on the playa for various years):

• The entrance road was my first real opportunity to put my RawHyde Adventure School training to use. It was about 20km off dirt road, including steep downhills, switchbacks, gravel and fine silty sand. I am pleased to report that I handled all with nothing more than minor trepidation.
• Upon my arrival at the gate, as I was waiting my turn to check in, I was astonished by one of the passengers of the next vehicle to arrive: none other than Miss Normal, former Mayor of Gigsville, former Seattle resident. I see her every 2-3 years on the playa. I suppose this is just another incarnation of playa, but wow were we both surprised (in the “WHAT! THE! FUCK!?! sort of way).
• During the opening ceremony, hearing a shocked voice say “STUART?!” and turning to see my friend Kyra, whom I hadn’t seen since a very spectacular wedding quite a few years ago. I knew she’d be there, she had no idea I would.
• 600 people doing the hokey pokey.
• Azzura, one of the Italians, had a howler monkey. Not a flying ninja howler monkey, but still. My brain still reels a bit thinking of it.
• As much as I love Repetitive Inside Joke Camp, I rather despise Other Peoples’ Repetitive Inside Joke Camp. Particularly at 7:30 in the morning when I’m just waking and as yet uncaffeinated, and the Other People in question are obnoxiously altered and loud “guests” of our camp. Which is to say: “time to go back to your own camp now, lovelies”.
• A key highlight: watching the documentary “Combust In Unity”, about the 2008 KiwiBurn. One of the filmmakers was a campmate. The film was a little rough, mostly due to being zero budget and very limited camera tech, but well worth the viewing.
• Logistics: pit toilets, shallow pits for vegetable food waste. Center Camp == “Middle of Nowhere”. The few big sound camps situated reasonably near each other, but with sound systems pointing in basically different directions.

Summary: If you dig Burning Man and have the opportunity, GO NOWHERE!

My friend Monika, with whom I am staying while in London, is a talented costumer in addition to being a living statue and mime performer. The other day, she generously asked me to do a rather impromptu photo shoot of her and her friend Marta in some of the costumes she’s made. Being a big fan of pretty women in fun outfits, I heartily agreed.

Here are a few shots from the day … needless to say, this was an incredibly fun time! :)

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Everything here was shot using available light – luckily the sky was providing a big softbox, varying between overcast and drizzly for most of the shoot. Nikon D700 with 50/1.8, 16-35/4, 70-200/2.8.

After my first frustrating night in England, my travels here have been delightful, interspersed with wonder at the sheer beauty of the landscape. I spent a couple days visiting a friend in Nottingham, then northward to Glasgow where I stayed in a hostel for a night, ate haggis, drank Scottish ale and slept well.

The next day I pointed myself toward Oban, with a constant palette of cool and gray and drizzly . I took the A82 up past Loch Lomond and Trossachs Towers National Park. Despite the rain, this was a glorious drive. The loch road is very very twisty and narrow, making for a very fun morning. Once I passed the loch itself and started up into the Highlands, the terrain grew rougher, wilder, more spartan. Rivers and streams crashed and trilled down the hillsides, filling the air with the music of water.

On the recommendation of my friend Iain, rather than picking up the A85 route to Oban – which would have been more direct – I continued on A82 up to Glencoe and Ballachulish. Simply gorgeous countryside, rugged and green in a sparse fashion.

I spent the night just outside Oban, couchsurfing with a fellow named Leo who lives in a WWII era signal station on the hill above Ganavan.

The next day, I headed south back into England, this time to ride through the Lake District. When I mentioned this route to Leo, he said “It’s like Little Scotland”, and I would have to agree with the sentiment.

In fact, the route I took through the Lake District was so lovely that (after another lovely night couchsurfing in Ulverston in the South Lake Peninsulas, with a charming British woman named Katie) I decided to retrace it the next morning, despite the several hour backtrack. For the return trip, I set up my GoPro camera and created a little time-lapse of the trip. Warning, it might be a little dizzying!

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From the Lakes, I headed south and west into Wales. I stayed the night in Newtown, in a charmless but functional guesthouse – part of its functionality was having a pub downstairs serving a perfectly acceptable bitter. The following day I rode south to Brecon, through Brecon Beacons National Park, and then on into London where I am now.

A few times already I’ve found myself regretted the whirlwind nature of my first few months in Europe stemming from various plans and meetings and rendezvous at far-flung points across the continent. Now is definitely one of those times. I’ve already decided that I’m going to need to return to the UK in the future, with hopefully a month or two to ride around at a more lesiurely pace. I didn’t have time to make it to Jura, I’d love to explore the northwest of Scotland, and want to revisit the Lake District and see more of Wales.

When I arrived in the UK, my first stop was Dover, to see the famed White Cliffs. Which are lovely.

After that, it’s been a bit of a debacle. My first night here I spent nearly five hours looking for a hotel room, finally falling into an available bed at nearly 4am after riding until the sky began to grow light.

I’ve already reconciled myself to the fact that I probably don’t have time to get to Jura, where I hope to visit the Shaw homelands.

But now? Now my motorcycle is due for a 6000 mile service (mostly oil change), and can’t get an appointment until at least Tuesday (in Nottingham, where I am currently), and at some dealers not for 2-3 weeks. I’ve been advised by a service manager in Edinburgh not to do the oil change myself, since there are apparently other checks as part of the 6k. I’ve also been advised not to stick with my Scotland plans with hopes of getting an appointment in London next Fri or Sat, as said plans will probably put me another 1000 miles or more past the interval mark.

Argh!

At this point I’m tempted to call all the dealers in London and see if any of them can help me out tomorrow. If so, I may just head there, get the needed service, and spend a few days in the southern part of the UK, blowing off Scotland plans entirely. Which is a disappointing option for me, admittedly, but I do need to be good to my trusty steed if it’s going to carry me as far as I plan to go.

Or, I could just drink a delicious alcoholic ginger beer and figure it all out later.

I am in love, and it makes me hurt.

Brugge, Belgium is quite possibly the most beautiful city I have ever seen. I’m staying just three minutes’ walk to the center square, and I’ve walked there three times in the 24 hours I’ve been here so far. I have, for the first time since arriving in Europe, thought that I could possibly live here. I’ve wandered down alleys and stopped to eat mussels and visited bars with more than 100 Belgian beers in bottle.

So has everyone else in the Western world. In his achingly funny European travel book “Neither Here Nor There”, Bill Bryson wrote:

Everything about it is perfect – its cobbled streets, its placid bottle-green canals, its steep-roofed medieval houses, its market squares, its slumbering parks, everything.

This was in 1990. In 2000, Brugge was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site, and now the perfect market squares have Subway sandwich shops and Quick Burger shops and seemingly hundreds of shops selling chocolate and lace and wooden shoes (it is in the Flemish / Dutch region of Belgium, after all). Certainly less perfect, but still magical. Sadly, I have read that the citizens of Brugge hate the same tourists that many of them now count on for income, for destroying their sleepy, charming fairy village. This doesn’t surprise me – a similar sentiment was quite common on Orcas Island when I lived there, and is prevalent in many tourist areas.

This doesn’t change the magic here, but it does tarnish it for me, which is selfish and dumb and makes me a little ashamed of myself. It’s strange. I’m here, clearly, as a tourist (as I write this, I’m sitting in the cafe of a hostel catering very much to foreign tourists), but generally don’t feel like one. Since arriving, I have mostly wandered around neighborhoods and back alleys and parks in the various cities I’ve seen, tending to avoid the most obvious tourist areas, but Brugge is so small – and I’m so close – that it’s hard not to stumble onto these areas without even trying.

I feel like this is an experience I’m going to have often over the coming months. Navigating this internal dichotomy will, I suspect, prove an interesting growth opportunity.

I expect to be posting a few photos – and maybe videos – that try to capture the beauty of this little gem – in the coming days.

As always, thanks to everyone who reads and comments and sends me little notes of love and support during my travels. I am so grateful for the chance to live this dream and to have so many people virtually tagging along for the ride.