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Housing and Cooling

You have three main options for housing at the Burn: tents, RVs, and yurts.

1) Tents. This is the most common option, and the cheapest. You'll want a dustproof one, don't get the ones with meshes that can't be zipped up. The Coleman Easy-Up tent is the tried and tested favorite. You'll want a 4 person tent if you're going alone, and at least an 8 person tent if you're going with 1 other person.

Nylon tents are the cheapest, and the hottest. Blackout tents are cooler, and cotton canvas tents like Kodiaks are supposed to be best, though I haven't tried them myself. That's because visible light getting into your tent is what creates the greenhouse effect that turns a nylon tent into a sauna.  Canvas tents breather better, lets less light through, and allows moisture to evaporate, which all helps keep the tent cooler.

A fairly expensive and popular option are Shift Pods. These are silver tents derivd from ice fishing tents. They're dustproof, easy to set up, slightly insulated, and fairly sturdy. They still turn into a sauna without cooling or a shade though. For the price, I don't think they're worthwhile but a lot of people like them.

In any case, the key thing is that you want to have a shade structure over your tent, because without it, it will become unbearably hot by early morning.

You will also need to make sure you secure the tents well with rebar (not recommended) or lag screws.

2) RVs. RVs are great, so long as you don't overstuff them (8-person RV can handle 2 people comfortably). They are expensive - about $500-$1000 per day, need to be cleaned before returning, and hard to drive.

You will need to have the grey and black water tanks pumped out during your stay at least once, and to do that you will need to either flag down a pump out truck which can take several hours, or be part of a camp that has pre-scheduled pump outs.

3) Yurts. Hexayurts can be very spacious, comfortable, and well-insulated

Cooling can be done with a fan, swamp cooler, or AC

A Figjam works pretty well for small spaces.
You will need to haul a lot of water though, unless your camp provides. You can use a 100W solar panel instead of hauling a battery up there, a Figjam sips only a few watts - less than 50W. (but with the dust, your panel will only put out 50% of less than rated)

A lager swamp cooler will cool a larger space. A modification you can make would be to use 7.5 gal bucket, add a switch and a float switch. Make sure you don't leave gaps around the cooler pad.

For AC, remember that it pulls more power as it gets hotter. Y/ou should get an inverter AC. Don't get a portable one that you put inside your tent (the ones with wheels and big ducts, they're very inefficient.


 

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