For one week each summer, Black Rock City rises from the Nevada playa — a temporary metropolis of 80,000 people built around art, gifting, and radical self-reliance. There’s no money exchanged on the playa (only ice and coffee are sold), no spectators (everyone participates), and on the final Saturday the giant wooden Man is burned to the ground.

Pro tip: this is not a festival to wing — bring 2 gallons of water per person per day, your own shelter, all your food, and a costume. Tickets release in waves starting in March; the Stewards Sale is the most affordable. Pack Out Everything You Pack In is sacred.