In 2011, Burning Man tickets sold out for the first time. This year, all 40,000 individual tickets went in just over an hour. The festival, which began in 1986 as a group of 20 watching an eight-foot human effigy burn on a San Francisco beach, has now gone mainstream, with some surprisingly big names joining the approximately 65,000 Burners in the Nevada desert. If you weren't lucky enough to have nabbed a ticket, or want to dip a toe into the festival water before going fully “radically self-reliant” at Burning Man, here are five other festivals to try.
Photo: Courtesy of Electric Forest / @electric_forest1/5Electric Forest Festival
Rothbury, Michigan
This four-day electronic and jam rock dance party is a relative newcomer at just five years old. Where Burning Man offers supreme variety, this fest is narrower in focus: The upscale Double JJ Resort (featuring a lake, water park, and—hilariously—a golf course) is transformed each year into an enchanted forest full of DJ-driven performances and twenty-somethings in whimsical costumes. And for those not interested in roughing it, air-conditioned restrooms, heated pools, daily brunch, and even private rooms with Wi-Fi are available.
Photo: Courtesy of Dominical Waverider / @dominicalwaverider2/5Envision Festival
Uvita, Costa Rica
Envision takes the cake for natural beauty, bringing fewer than 5,000 people to a stunning beachside jungle in Costa Rica to viva la experiencia (live the experience). Since 2011, people have been gathering to enjoy music (there are four stages), but are primarily arriving with more holistic aims. Yoga, drumming circles, “village witches” running a healing sanctuary, massages, an herbal first aid station, and organic and locally sourced food are central to the fabric of the gathering.
Photo: Courtesy of Steven Morrow / @morrowsteven3/5AfrikaBurn
Tankwa, South Africa
The Burning Man mantra of “radical self-reliance” is alive and well here at AfrikaBurn, a nine-year-old festival located in a desert area about 250 miles outside of Cape Town. Bring everything you need, as only ice is sold at the event, and according to its Eleven Principles, unlike Burning Man, this isn’t a barter economy, it’s a gift economy, "about giving without expecting anything in return,” it reads. There are dramatic art installations (including San Clan, its take on the Man) and mutant vehicles, but as the 10,000 or so attendees skew younger than Burning Man, expect fewer mellow meditation pits and more of a party atmosphere.
Photo: Courtesy of Jojo Rutherford / @jojorutherford4/5Secret Garden Party
Abbots Ripton, England
Hidden away in the English countryside, this event has grown from fewer than 1,000 to almost 30,000 “gardeners” since its inception in 2004. Dance, play in the lake, listen to a Guerilla Science lecture, get in the middle of a paint fight, and bring your Wellies for the frequent sprinkles (and occasional downpours). Just don’t let the tame “garden party” name fool you: There are also plenty of debaucheries afoot in this camp, once described as a “forest rave” and “hedonistic haven.”
Photo: Courtesy of Barbz / @barbzizon5/5Nowhere
Northern Spain
If you’re looking for the feel of the early days of Burning Man, pre giant flashing installations, EDM music, and swelling crowds, this is for you. Last year, around 1,000 “Nobodies” arrived in the Spanish desert for this relatively low-key seven-day event—technically a regional Burning Man event governed by the same Ten Principles of self-expression, self-reliance, and the like. There is a party scene, but art is the focus of Nowhere, and in the many barrios scattered around the camp you’ll find inventive art installations amid classes like Kundalini meditation, Tea & Techno, mandala making, Tantric techniques, and fire spinning.
