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Future Turtles 2023 - Burning Man Theme Camp
So, you're thinking about camping with the Turtles?
Yay! We love you too. The Future Turtles are a welcoming group of friends that spend time together during the year and at Burning Man.
Here’s a little guide we put together to help you decide if you should camp with us.
We’re pretty nerdy.
We are, to a large extent, nerds, engineers, programmers, gaymers, creators and artists, scientists and philosophers. A lot of us know our way around Python, LED circuits, computer science, and Monty Python. Debates about tabs vs. spaces turn us on.
We are a male gay camp.
Everyone is welcome, but we work actively to create a safe gay haven in a heteronormative world.
We’re burners.
We try very hard not to be one of those camps that hosts parties at Burning Man that are indistinguishable from parties in San Francisco. Time on playa is too short to waste it by sipping vodka sodas, bopping slowly to some pop diva disco music, and getting judgy looks from tall men with perfect abs.
We are at Burning Man to get lost in dust storms, to jury-rig elaborate outdoor social showers, to fall asleep in a geodesic dome while somebody explains how to manifest aligned consciousness, to watch frat boys swinging from trapezes while removing their own shorts, and to chase sharks across the desert in a whaling ship.
We share a lot of the same values, and if you share those values, join us!
No spectators.
Participation is key to being a Turtle. Burning Man is a temporary city, not a music festival. The best experiences come from participating in the civic life of that city, not from watching things other people are doing. We put on multiple events during the week and put a lot of emphasis on active participation in the city.
Everybody works.
Camping for a week in the harsh Black Rock Desert is tough. We try to make it easier by collaborating to build a beautiful camp, organizing delicious shared meals together, and providing communal gifts to the Burning Man community.
The magic of Burning Man is the collaboration. Not only will you be collaborating to build something really awesome that you can be proud of, but you will test your own limits, learn many new skills, and make incredible friends for life. Burning Man is a transformative experience and the people you go through it with make all the difference.
This all takes a ton of work, both in the months leading up to the event getting everything ready, and during the week of Burning Man itself. To camp with us, you can expect to put in several days of work before you even get to the event, and several hours of shifts every day once we’re there.
If that sounds like too much, that’s fine! Maybe you would like to go on a cruise ship? You will not have to work there at all.
Sliding scale for camp fees.
Our camp fees are “pay what you can” but we have three recommended levels:
No one is turned away for lack of funds, and if you need financial support to get to Burning Man, we can help. (You must apply for the Burning Man Ticket Aid program to take advantage of this).
No drama.
Burning Man is very hard and most people, at some point, have some major emotional moments. Usually a pickle and a nap will fix you right up. If that doesn’t, we have a team of volunteers called the Future Turtles Guardians to help. That said, behavior which creates unnecessary conflict or drama will detract from other peoples’ experience on playa and won't be tolerated.
Burning Man is very hard and most people, at some point, have some major emotional moments. Usually a pickle and a nap will fix you right up. If that doesn’t, we have a team of volunteers called the Future Turtles Guardians to help. That said, behavior which creates unnecessary conflict or drama will detract from other peoples’ experience on playa and won't be tolerated.