Samhain 2006 Festival Guide
Welcome to Samhain!
You’ve bought your ticket! Hurray! We’re so glad that you’ll be there with us!
So, where do we start? This version of this document was completed on 24 August. If the version that you’ve read before had an earlier date, there’s new information in here.
The Land Crews have spent a number of their weekends out in the wild shaping, smoothing and healing. The bath house has been repaired and painted. They’ve mowed and cleaned up the place. If there’s time, you can still spend a Saturday lending a hand. It’s a good time and it’s free.
So, what can we expect?
The site opens at noon on Thursday, 18 October. If you can be there when the gate opens, feel free to get out and greet your friends. We’ll get the gate open as close to noon as we can.
The gate will close each evening at 7:30 PM (really, we’re serious). The gate will open each of the next three days at 8:00 AM.
If you do get there early, please pull your car off to the left side of the road. Please leave plenty of room for the delivery trucks that will be making last minute calls.
What kind of weather can we expect? We’ll be paying close attention to the weather, but you can do that too.
For a weather forecast, try:
http://www.weather.com/weather/cities/us_tx_flatonia.html
Our two biggest expenses are chemical toilets and trash removal (and our expenses are your expenses).
As is customary, we’ll have the toilets distributed around the site, and they’ll be serviced in the mornings. Chemical toilets are much like your toilets at home. Be careful what you throw into them. You wouldn’t throw a beer bottle, can, glow stick or other object that might clog it up into your toilet at home. Though these toilets look like they can hold anything, the pumps that clean them out can jam on surprisingly small objects. If you had to disassemble a pump that had been pumping raw sewage to remove a glow stick, you’d get annoyed. Our toilet company guys get annoyed too, and when they do, they charge us extra.
Please don’t throw anything into the toilet unless you’ve eaten it first.
The other big expense is trash. We have to pay someone to haul the dumpsters away.
The Rowdy Recyclers will come by each day at 10:00 AM and 3:00 PM (except on Thursday when traffic makes that impractical).
Please bag your trash carefully. We don’t have machines, we have your camp-mates picking up the bagged trash and transferring it to a trailer, then into the dumpster.
The more trash we have to haul out, the bigger the dumpsters that we have to rent. Before you even start to pack, please consider disposable packaging.
- New tent? Take it out of the box and count poles and stakes. Leave the box at home.
- New stove, lantern or air mattress? Leave the box at home (and save yourself space).
- A case of ½ liter water bottles? Consider 2 of the 2½ gallon jugs. More water, less waste.
- It’s a bit of an investment, but consider a “bulk” propane tank (don’t forget the hose and fittings). Bulk propane cost a third (more or less) of what the 1 pound bottles cost, and you don’t fill the trash with propane bottles.
- Leave as much packaging at home as you can. (I’ll bet that most of you can find more reductions than I).
The last trash run will be at 3:00 PM on Sunday. If you miss that run, please take your trash to the dumpster yourself (unless you can take it home). If it’s left out, the local fauna will come out and decorate the site with your trash. Should you find someone else's bit of escaped trash, please place it into the nearest barrel.
In the event of drought conditions, the area could be under a fire ban. If the fire ban is in place, it will have been set by the authorities in Fayette County, not the CMA. We are always careful to observe the burning restrictions that may be in place. The e-tickets will contain information on any restrictions on burning, though more current information will be available at the site. In the event that fires are permitted, consider the environmental effect of your fires.
If you want a campfire, you need to confine your campfire to a metal enclosure or grill. If you want a fire on the ground, plan on camping around or near one of the existing fire rings that will be set at the site. If you camp in an area that does not have a fire ring but you think it would be a great place to have one, contact one of the guardians who will find the “fire ring team” and a determination will be made as to the possibility of adding a new ring. There are a few locations on the site where underground pipes and other objects may prevent you from putting the fire ring in place. Our fire ring team will know the location of these things.
The CMA will arrange for ice to be sold as always. Inquire at the Crazy Merlin’s in the vendor area.
The CMA requires all cars not needed to sustain the health of the members (and so marked with permits from the CMA) be parked in a parking area that is across the creek from the camping area. Please move your vehicle there as soon as your camp is established. In the event of wet weather, you car will be on the same side of the creek as the exit (the crossing may not be passable by cars for a while (days) following a rain.) You may purchase a parking permit, but the price is now $20.
Bubbling Cauldron
The Cauldron food services are back. It will be a joint production between CMA and our regular caterer. A food ticket will cost $50, and cover Friday on. Meals will be available for purchase on Wednesday evening for setup crews, and Thursday for all three meals. Gary will still prepare desserts.
The Ellens’ Café will have snacks for sale and free coffee, tea, etc. Gary has procured new pots! The café will have cold drinks for sale all day.
The Event Services Desk will not be located under CMA One at Samhain, it will be located to the South near the power outlets beside the road. Since we shall not be selling tickets after the deadline on 30 September, the Event Services Desk will not be accepting money save for on-field parking passes ($20).
There will be a radio at Event Services Desk.
The fires will have themes each night.
The first night will be Renewal (“Forged Anew”), and dancers from the Temple of the Dancers will start the evening.
The Friday night fire will begin with the funeral procession.
The Saturday night fire will be the traditional Saturday fire.
Soon, there will be information about workshops and rituals! It isn’t too late to submit your workshop and ritual ideas, and the more the merrier! So dust off your ideas and share them with us at Samhain. The form is available here.