festival frenzy

Me, my boyfriend (J), and my friend (K) went camping together at this hippy fest. I'll keep the name and place anonymous for paranoia purposes. Anyway, we set up our camp and started introducing ourselves to our neighbors. These dudes next to us had three nitrous tanks and they were perfectly happy to keep handing us balloons as long as we kept rolling them joints. That was pretty much all we did the first night... it was the second night that really kicked our asses.


J and I were walking around and we bought a quarter of mushrooms off of two different guys. The one eighth was practically all caps and I'm not even sure they were cubensis (not that I'm any sort of expert), and the second eighth (definitely cubensis) was very pretty - the mushrooms were whole, no broken bits, and they looked newly dried. We walked back to our campsite, and we decided to each eat an eighth, but we divided the mushrooms evenly, so we could each have both of the different kinds. I can usually eat half of an eighth plain, but this time I put a thin layer of peanut butter on a rice cake, put the mushrooms on top of that, and added another layer of peanut butter. It was really good actually, I couldn't really taste them at all, and the texture of the rice cake disguised the texture of the mushrooms. Now that I think back on it, I'm pretty sure I ate more than an eighth. Anyway, K had obtained an eighth from some other dude and we all munched down at the same time.


They hit everyone pretty quickly - we started feeling the effects in about twenty minutes. I was sitting in my camp chair when I started to notice the sheer beauty of the trees. The leaves were just beginning to change, and there were beautiful reds, yellows, and oranges. It was about five o'clock and the sun was just beginning to go down a little. I have always been a big fan of the time just before twilight. The light comes through the trees in such a way that everything looks golden. I was getting peaceful vibrations... Mother Nature knew I was about to connect with her, and she was ready to show me her secrets. A group of small trees with colorful leaves growing up them began to dance. Suddenly they morphed into Native Americans - shamans performing a ritual. This was a particularly interesting visual because the campground we stayed at is one of the highest places in the state and it was a meeting place for the different Indian tribes hundreds of years ago.


K then started to giggle and of course I could only follow her lead. We then decided to make our way to the bathroom. The path leading to it was gravel, and it was pretty difficult to walk on. It felt like each stone was about a foot high and I just kept rolling around on them. God only knows what I looked like to other people trying to walk down this path! I kept looking at people and their faces were morphing into other people's that I knew, which was really messing with me because this campground is close to my hometown and it was reasonable that I would see people that I knew. Anyway, we finally got back to the campsite and we decided to smoke a doob because we all felt slightly nauseous. K went to her tent to lie down after awhile, and as I was sitting in my chair my vision shifted. This is kind of hard to explain, but it was like another world was presented to me, almost as though I could see into a different dimension. The world had perfectly laid out streets and pyramids everywhere. I also saw something that looked like the Sphinx in Egypt. The streets and the buildings (if you even want to use such a mundane word as "buildings" for what I saw)were all jewel encrusted - mostly emeralds and some kind of beautiful gold stones. I consider this a glimpse at another civilization. Perhaps it was the aliens that helped the Egyptians build the pyramids? I guess that's for me to figure out.


Anyway, the vision faded away and I was temporarily
in the "real" world again. Suddenly I started to feel very sick. I decided to get in my tent and wait it out. Sharp pains were hitting my stomach like I have never felt while shrooming (and I have eaten a whole eighth before). I started rocking back and forth and I started to cry because I had never felt such awful pain in my entire life. J came into the tent to find out what was going on with me, and he felt pretty sick too. He stumbled out of the tent and threw up immediately. After that he felt terrific. He decided that I needed to throw up too. I chugged about half a gallon of water and stuck my finger down my throat, but I still could not vomit. It was the most horrible feeling in the world. I'm not sure if mixing the different kinds of shrooms did it to me or what, but let me just say that tripping your ass off and feeling that sick at the same time is not cool. I didn't even know which was up or down, let alone what the hell was the matter with me. I think it'll be awhile before I eat that many mushrooms at once again.


After a few hours of feeling like I was going to die, I got out of the tent and sat in front of our campfire. All of a sudden I wasn't tripping anymore. It was pretty strange... I had an amazing peak and then BOOM it was over, no comedown or anything. I was pretty relieved though, considering how badly I felt. I ate some food to get the shrooms moving through my stomach, and then I felt much better. I still felt pretty bad, but anything was better than the feeling I had earlier. I started walking around talking to people and every person I talked to (which was A LOT) was either shrooming right then or had shroomed earlier. I would like to know how many pounds were going around at that festival! A few hours later (about midnight) I decided to roll with J. That definitely made me feel better, and it allowed me to consider my trip positively. As always, I had an enlightening experience, even though it took such a bad turn in the end. Happy shrooming everyone!