What we ultimately ended up doing, however, was deciding to take a vacation from Burning Man but still attend Burning Man. That means we scaled absolutely everything way, way back. We took on no projects, which meant our summer nights and weekends were not filled with PVC and solar panels. We packed the smalled camp we've had since 1996, which meant we didn't even need to use our trailer. We were only on the playa from Monday through Thursday, which meant that we saw the build-up of the city but missed the weekend wackiness.
And let me tell you, it was great! For the first time in many years, we drove off the playa feeling good rather than tired and grumpy. We're already excited for next year, much to our surprise.
But I know you don't really care about all this, you just want to see some pictures. Well, our big overall simplication plan also meant that I never took the good camera out of the car! Instead, I just used a small point-and-shoot, and I hardly even used that. In fact, had Carol not taken part in a photo scavenger hunt, we may have come away without any pictures at all. So anyway, what you see here are two small categories: some of the pictures from the hunt, and a few other miscellaneous ones. Hey, it's still more than I expected to bring back.