An exhaustive list of things that might prove useful at Burning Man, and my entirely subjective analysis of their utility.
Burning Man is a great example of a extreme weather desert environment; it has a high diurnal temperature variation (day-to-night), with highs of 100 deg F and lows of 40 deg F. Humidity is very low.
Do not be alarmed by the length; you will not want or need the vast majority of this list. Read the comments. I will be sorting and ranking later to pare it down to a useful checklist.
Deciding when to change into what can be kind of tricky, due to the high day/night temperature difference. My second year, I made sure as much as I could buy was already the color of the sand.
These boots were amazingly comfortable. The laces are a bit annoying when you're tired, but other than that, these shoes are perfect. They are also the exact color of burning man dust and so never looked "dirty". Great for hiking; all-around the best and lightest boots I've ever had.
Very important. You will want one pair per two days at least.
Best desert shirt, most popular REI item. Used lots.
Very useful! Not as flexible as a keffiyeh, but better for shade. The clip and cord to prevent it from blowing off is a must for Burning Man.
I'd recommend the sand-colored one, since everything ends up that color anyway.
Nice light-weight thermals; get them in sand. Some years it's much colder than others.
Nice light-weight comfortable thermals in sand color.
Very useful for several hours every night.
Very useful.
Very useful.
Very useful.
Never used; too hot during the day.
Great stuff. White gets very sand-colored though. Not as good as heatgear.
Great stuff. White gets very sand-colored though. Not as good as heatgear.
Could be useful if you're not afraid of burning your calves.
Useful but prone to sunburn
Didn't bother
Didn't try but popular.
Didn't use.
Never used; my trench worked fine the one time it rained.
Useful at night
By birkenstocks have arches that are way too high so my feet chafe in them. Permanent fail.
Didn't bring
Looking at people in the stores still wearing their BM gear was funny. We looked like terribly bedraggled, flamboyant bums.
Something to collect your laundry is very important.
Didn't buy but if you wear sneakers, you will wish you had - too much dust in the shoes, on the feet.
Funny novelty, but breeze was always present. More useful in sunny, still weather.
barrel pump for drinking water
Per person per day; 1.5 gallons (minimum, for drinking) to 3 gallons of water per person per day (for washing and bathing).
Stock with frozen water bottles, not ice, line with reflectix - this seemed to make them last much longer. Also don't put them directly on the ground; the thermal transfer is much higher that way. Instead, support them off the ground.
For pouring water into cups.
Wonderful, amazing, most magical thing I brought. It's hard to believe it doesn't require anything but water. Very useful.
Very useful. Great look and size for the playa (small - almost like a large purse in carrying capacity - too small to carry a pair of shoes).
For more capacity; the MULE is just too small.
2l of water (66 Oz) for you, but more cargo space, insulated water line, integrated mouthpiece.
Though I didn't use this at burning man, I later used it at Vegas and it's AWESOME. Compared to a hat, which restricts air circulation to your head, and is also warm, this is like it's always a cloudy day under there! Plus it's less than a foot long, so very compact. Would get again.
This ran on 8 alkaline D cells all week (every day) and never ran down the batteries. I used it to keep a breeze in our tent during the day. Quite useful.
I took our cooler's melted ice, loaded it into this, and went around spraying people during the hottest part of the day. It was actually quite fun. :-)
This was useful for wicking up excess water from the mixing bowl (through capillary action) and letting it dry, cooling and humidifying the air, a little. But mostly it evaporated water off.
This was a catchbasin below our water container.
This actually predicted rain one day! Very pleased.
Somewhat difficult to measure internal temperature.
Too fragile... decided not to bring. Might be okay for keeping air circulating in a normally-stale tent.
Worked but was a tad small for playa; barely used.
Dried up skin too much to be useful.
Worked well one night to keep us warm just before dawn. Other years it was much colder.
propane tanks
Great for getting up in the coldest part of a night to go to the loo.
Wonderful!!! Great to have. So useful for sleeping at night.
Worked pretty well... tended to deflate over time but all of them do.
Slow but worked; not as slow as manual pump, either. Useful for avoiding excess work.
This turned out to be a great way to sleep during the day, if you had enough breeze. This was possible the first day after I set up the shade but before I put up the shade cloth walls.
It can get REALLY COLD just before dawn. I woke up one morning, shivering, because I was so cold! Had a hard time stopping.
pillow cases
Didn't bring.
Didn't bring.
Oddly enough, my keffiyeh/shemagh/tactical scarf was the second most useful piece of equipment on the playa. Keeps the sun off your head by day, can be wet into an evaporative cooler. By night, it keeps your head warm (or your neck if you have a hat). If a dust storm arises, you can pull it over your mouth, and a few layers of cloth work as well as a dust mask. Configured this way it might also help keep you hydrated, since you'll be breathing in your own moist breath. It can also double as a towel, a bandage, etc.... Highly recommended. Only caveat is that while wearing it over your mouth, it could cause goggles to fog up.
Seems like a sturdy, inexpensive sun hat.
Girlfriend said this was an awesome dust mask.
Minor complaint is that one of the vents kept coming apart. Same vent design as previous mask. Looked cool though!
Didn't bring due to space considerations.
This actually seemed to be nearly necessary.
WTF is that? I don't even know.
vaseline
lotions
Very useful, but in retrospect, the spray-on kind was nicer; the greasy kind tended to mix with playa dust in an unpleasant way.
This looks like a good deal for spray-on.
This was great but it was simply too big to carry. I wish I had had several smaller bottles, one in each pack. Other than that it was great to have at the camp.
This is basically a powerful moisturizer and seemed very necessary, as playa dust is very hygroscopic. Not just for hands! Also feet. Worked great.
Many people didn't believe me that this would be necessary. After a few days in the dust, you don't realize how painful and cracked your hands and feet are getting until after you spray a dilute vinegar solution on your hands! The sounds of relief from my campmates were quite audible as they sprayed this on. I recommend this, followed by an optional water bath, followed by the gloves in a bottle. I did this on both my hands and feet.
These were quite necessary for sleeping around 9 and H where the music was loud and nearly constant.
I never actually used these, sorry to say.
I had to combine these with my ear plugs to sleep when my campmates started playing drums.
In the desert, you sweat a lot (but don't notice it because it dries so fast), and if you don't have vents, it will accumulate quickly and fog up enclosed goggles. Non-enclosed eye protection like sunglasses doesn't have that problem but also won't protect you from sandstorms. Also, the more skin area your goggles cover, the more sweat will evaporate into them, and the more venting you need to prevent fogging.
This was the best eye protection I had there and didn't fog up.
These were quite useful and portable as backups to my masks.
This is quite necessary for day sleeping unless you have a hexayurt, which is pitch black and cool.
I somehow misplaced these and didn't get to try at BM. However, they're nice around town. Very, very durable, best value on sunglasses I've bought.
These seemed like a good idea but I found more use for them off the playa, though the mirror finish wears off quickly. On the playa, the day mask was more useful.
This paintball-style mask wasn't as good as the Rothco; it tended to fog up more easily. Would not buy again.
You will use your bike tons. I mean it! This bike kind of annoys me in that it has 22" wheels, which are almost impossible to find. It's nothing special, looks a bit like a unicycle in that the frame is so low, and will need decoration to seem cute at Burning Man. It will get incredibly dusty everywhere, so I'd recommend spending less on a burner bike. Many people bought $75 bikes at Wal-Mart in Reno. This is a folder, so easier to transport there and back. Seriously, going anywhere on foot in that kind of dust really takes forever, and you won't want to do it. I marked mine with a flasher and reflective tape so that I could find it in a pile or at a rack very easily. This was important since you could waste 30 minutes looking for your bike at center camp, if you weren't careful.
Don't be a statistic! Lock your bike. My girlfriend lost hers, ten feet from our camp; turns out one of her friends recognized it and took it, thinking it belonged to her camp. It wasn't malicious, and she got it back, but it definitely ruined a day or two and a small lock would have helped. More importantly, a name tag would really help! However, I do not recommend these locks; I accidentally tried to bike off without unlocking mine, and it literally disintegrated! The main hassle was not the lock - that fell into four pieces - but that the cable became tied up in my gears. This was one of the most ridiculous bike locks ever made. DO NOT GET THIS LOCK, get a better one.
bike basket, milk crate, rack
bike tool kit
repair book for bike
Got at Reno Wal-Mart, never used.
These are good for passing pedestrians in whiteouts, of which there were many in 2012. I personally don't like the incredibell so much since it only gives one ding per use.
I found this great; left it on the last four days, and it never ran out of juice. Great way to find your own bike.
This was great; I was able to see the road in front of me at night. Wish I had given more thought as to where to mount it, though, as it was off-center since my basket mount clip was centered.
Did not work.
Unfortunately I forgot to bring mine!
Good luck with finding a 22" tube.
Found one but didn't need it.
Keeps it from being misidentified/stolen. I ended up using reflective tape, which works for identification but isn't very... well, decorative.
YOUR TICKETS!
TODO - burning man directory
Never used.
TODO - cigarettes
TODO - name tags / labels / label maker (to label your address on everything)
Never used.
I actually ended up just taping over the holes (microphone, USB, HDMI) on my phone and using it as-is. Since I never dropped it into sand, it was no big deal.
I just kept all my stuff in my huge tent.
Never felt like writing. Way too much going on.
Was great, could be better apps. For example, show me EVERYTHING going on now, or starting in next hour. Not just the one-time events, nor just the recurring events; everything.
Wonderful fun!
Totally misplaced these prior to trip, never found.
Turns out that EL wire is THE BEST way to make yourself visible at night; put it on your chest, backpack, and bike. It's kind of a pain in the ass to attach to clothing, so you may need to sew it on. It takes a long time to decorate a bike properly too; and by long time, I mean 15 minutes; that feels like a long time to miss out on what's going on.
Never used.
Couldn't fit in vehicle to get there. It's a pretty fragile costume, actually.
Didn't use. Ever.
Nearly necessary, since everything's pretty dry out there.
Nearly necessary.
I recommend a lot of anti-anxiety medications; perhaps a benzodiazapene or, propranolol. If you find yourself even slightly cranky, take them! I also recommend some kind of sedative such as ambien because it can be hard to sleep sometimes.
I got burned the first day or two, and really needed this.
This turned out to be relatively useful.
To help you sleep and recover, I recommend something like this. Sleeping can be hard, and being sleep deprived makes you cranky!
I basically drank gatorade the whole time and after three days started to feel fine. I really didn't feel like eating much anyway; only 5 meals in 10 days. So gatorade really helped. Just plan on drinking that plus a few meals.
Those adverse to sugar might prefer Nuun tablets over gatorade. Dehydration makes certain people, like me, very cranky!
OTC medications
Get several bottles.
Never got or used
Never used
Never used.
Never used. Already part of most first aid kits.
Never used - don't overclock your CPU in the desert!
Never used - don't overclock your CPU in the desert!
Used a few of these, unsure if it did much.
Never used - don't overclock your CPU in the desert!
Didn't bring.
vitamins and minerals
My campmates were really impressed with this shade structure! They all thought it was the best thing our camp had. Other people struggled the entire time to set up a decent shade structure and this thing was done the first day. MUST HAVE. AWESOME. Only problem is that the ten foot poles are a bit hard to transport. Note that it comes with six pieces of straight rebar, and so you will need a sledge and tools to remove it (e.g. vise grips).
I basically put this up on the upwind side (which was also sunset), and the side where the sun rose. This allowed us to avoid sun all day, but keep two sides open. It also meant that in the worst whiteouts, we couldn't even tell it was bad. Only downside is that it really cut back on the breeze, so it became difficult to sleep during the day, even on the cot. This shade cloth was too long for the height of the tent, so I doubled it up on the bottom two feet, which cut down on kicked up dust getting in.
These were a bit time-consuming to get in and out, but worked absolutely great, better than rebar. I used rebar as a turning tool to screw them in. The first four inches, it basically dug dust up, but once I got beyond that, they anchored in pretty well.
4 more auger anchors from Harbor Freight
This was a wonderful tent; huge, easy to stand up in, two rooms. Great buy!
Used this a bit, was handy.
Never used, but would have worked well.
Used once or twice on boxes.
Used this quite a bit; was extremely durable.
Never used; three rolls is too much.
Didn't bring.
Never used.
Used to line our ice chests... helped them stay cold.
This was great, I highly recommend, because once your feet get sandy, it's very annoying to get them clean again, and you don't want to track that into your tent.
N/A - stuff to cover end of rebar with (e.g. stuffed animals, tennis balls)
N/A - 5 lbs sledge hammer (not rubber mallet) for rebar
Never used.
TODO - spade, rake
step stool
hammer
I got some with kevlar so I wouldn't cut myself. Worked great. VERY IMPORTANT to bring these.
TODO - campsite cleanup tools
Didn't bring.
This made excellent rigging for the shade structure.
TODO - stake puller / auger turner
TODO - handheld auger
Also used to make my bike highly visible at night.
Very very useful for shade structure and cloth
Never used
Didn't bring
Would have been useful, but better to sew things on ahead of time.
rubber bands
TODO - clothes pins
Didn't use.
Didn't use.
sandpaper
steel wool
TODO - Needles and heavy thread
TODO - Grommet repair kit
Didn't use.
Didn't use.
TODO - Self Stick Nylon Fabric Repair Kit
Didn't use.
TODO - bailing wire
TODO - sewing kit
In the desert, you won't feel like you're sweating very much, because it evaporates off quickly. If you're used to humid climates, you may not realize how much you are losing, unless you lay against something which won't breathe, in which case a layer of sweat forms between it and you very quickly. Fortunately, you won't stink too much.
Great stuff! I used it every day. I never stank.
This worked pretty well.
You only need this deodorant every other day.
You'll use this a lot.
Very necessary if you think stealing from the potties is wrong, which I do.
I somehow misplaced mine before leaving.
Quite useful.
Quite useful.
This is the only way my girlfriend ended up without dreadlocks.
Didn't arrive in time.
We bought this but never used it; the gray water becomes a mud/disposal problem.
TODO - canned air - don't leave in sun
Never used. Showers - getting the water, disposing of the water - were a logistical problem.
moist towelettes / handy-wipes / etc
Hardly ever used, but was neat!
Very useful.
Didn't bring - too heavy. Others brought, and they were useful.
N/A - full-length mirror
TODO - milk crates used as stacking storage - keeps thigns from flying around
TODO - stackable airtight storage containers with lids (no dust)
Contrary to what I expected, you will not instantly adapt to blindness; when you have a mound of gear and clothes, you will not be able to find it by touch alone.
Most useful item, bar none. Couldn't do without it at night, even with tent light on, I couldn't see what I was looking for. Had some NiCd AAAs that came pre-charged, but they ran out in it really quickly. Fortunately AAAs are small and easy to carry. It takes three so that's a bit inconvenient to recharge anyway (most solar chargers will charge two at a time).
Used once or twice. Not nearly as useful as headlamp.
Worked great on D cells the entire trip! Not quite bright enough to find all things in the tent, but enough to find the general location, or to find clothes.
Worked great! Charged all day, ran all night.
Didn't have space for a second one of these, but might have been nice decoration. Vastly more economic than running lights off an inverter.
Not necessary.
Never used.
Forgot to bring these.
At first, rechargable batteries seemed like a great idea. But when I realized I'd have to pay attention to how long they took to charge and swap them, I started to feel like I was serving them instead of the other way around. I gave up quickly.
Noticed that during the day, the readings were off the right end of the chart; optimal for recharging. I charged up some AAAs but had no interest in timing the recharge, nor did I have a voltmeter. I was kind of annoyed that my headlamp used three, but the charger only charged two at a time.
Didn't use.
Didn't use.
This lets you use AA batteries in devices that take D cells.
This lets you use AA batteries in devices that take C cells.
Didn't use.
Worked great! Wonderful, cost-effective panel.
Worked great the one time I used it.
Didn't bother to install them into anything. Too time consuming.
Didn't bring - it was my backup.
Made it for my girlfriend once or twice.
Cheaper elsewhere, but very tasty.
Mostly, I just suggest paper plates and plasticware.
Used one all the time. Never used the others.
Never used.
Didn't bring due to space limitations.
Didn't bring due to space limitations. Washing dishware meant you had to waste water and dispose of graywater... which was a PITA.
Very useful.
STILL SORTING THESE OUT...
celdek media for evaporative cooler
solar backpack
air conditioned pants
"Your shopping list is pretty intense" -- a compliment given to me :-)