Astral Outpost

I’ve been going to Burning Man since 2014, with a few years off in between, and I’ve camped with groups ranging from 15 to 70 people. While I love the smaller camps, somewhere around 40-50 people is the sweet spot for me. Big enough to build real infrastructure and meet people you wouldn’t otherwise, but small enough that you still get the chance to connect with everyone over the course of a week.

The camp is mostly based out of London and draws an international crowd of smart, kind nerds. I joined in 2024 after camping next door with Treblemakers and liking how they were organized, their friendliness, and the fact that they had a comfortable social hangout space, which matters more than you’d think when you’re camping in the desert.

During the week, we serve soft-serve ice cream, which is a slightly absurd idea for a desert setting, but it works well because soft-serve is essentially a protein shake mix that gets cooled on the spot. We turn the experience into a party set in our public space: a huge canvas tent with rugs and sofas. Each day, a different team picks a theme and comes up with creative toppings; we have DJs and musicians playing, and waiting in line becomes part of the experience. A lot of parents bring their kids, and Burners from surrounding camps stop by daily. I love that it becomes a gathering point for the neighborhood. Most people refer to us as “the ice cream camp.”

I’m on the organizing and build team. In 2025, I took over the kitchen shift plan for all 60 people, which meant figuring out who’s doing what, when they need to show up, and what exactly the job involves when they get there. Before I picked it up, shifts ran on goodwill and inherited knowledge, and in practice, that meant the same handful of reliable people doing most of the work. I tend to be allergic to inefficiencies, must be the German in me, so I built a system that worked. It helped reduce stress and arguments once we were on the playa, which made it more satisfying than it probably sounds.

As a child and teenager, I spent a lot of time in the scouts, and building this camp every year feeds the part of me that enjoys building things in groups, out in nature, with changing conditions and whatever gets thrown at you. If Burning Man is still around when I’m old, I see myself out there in the desert in a dusty wheelchair cruising this ephemeral city.