gaminwench wrote:Full report upon return???
Melonblue wrote:and pictures; if possible, please
There was a rain/thunder/lightning storm coming in from the east/south east when we arrived at about sundown on Friday. We raced the storm from the 8 mile playa entrance to our camp (about 12 o'clock & trash fence) and when we arrived there was some lightning very close by that had us sitting in our cars for a while. When that passed we set up our camp in the dark and the rain which had passed by the time we went to bed.
The next morning when we drove to Frog Pond we drove over a lot of very bumpy playa, there were big mounds and large ditches. We found one ditch at about 70mph and I have a very impressive bruise on my butt to prove it. The car is also not in the best state...
On Saturday afternoon a dust storm rolled in from the direction of Razorback. It was well and truly goggles and mask weather but we sat out in it on top of a collapsed tent stopping it from blowing away. There were some tiny pebbles in the wind that stung a bit but nothing that made us desperately want to seek shelter. The dust passed in less that an hour (I think?) but the wind kept coming for a few more.
We heard it was supposed to rain heavily and thunder from 4am to 9am Sunday morning but it was only drizzle when we went to bed and when we woke up at 7am the skies were clear. It didn't seem like there had been much if any rain over night. We packed up and were off playa before midday but some or our group stayed on to finish their survey work for their art project. By 7:30pm Sunday evening the weather had turned. Instead of being done with their measurements by 9pm they weren't ready to leave until 11pm. At 1:22am we received this message "Sadly, all playa exits appear to be impassible. We have tried four or five of them now, and it's all mud." That was quickly followed by this though; "Actually, we found some crazy backroad and we are now off-playa."
Except for the couple of bouts of rain/wind/thunder the weather was actually really lovely. It wasn't oppressively hot during the day or particularly cool at night. I slept with just a sheet on Saturday night.
The playa surface near where we camped had a decent crust on it and was quite solid and flat. Apart from what had been driven over while slightly moist that is. As we were leaving we drove over to roughly where we camped last year at 3-ish and A/B-ish. We used the Time to Burn app to find our way and once we hit the city we were able to make out the paths of last year's roads. That area was in noticeably worse shape. The ground was a lot less flat and crust was a lot more crumbly. There weren't any piles of soft powder like there were when we arrived last year but it seemed like that was only due to the rain in the previous few days and the mounds of powder were sitting just a few millimetres under the crust waiting to resurface with the slightest disturbance.
If you'd like to see my Facebook album of the weekend it's
here. Fair warning, it includes a picture of the bruise on my bum
If you're just interested in Playa porn check out this
Imgur album of pictures I took of just the playa.
