Inside wild Burning Man festival — from orgy dome to ‘happy ending’ spa

Every year in the middle of Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, thousands of free-spirited people erect a temporary city to enjoy an “erotically charged” environment celebrating art and self-expression.

The Burning Man Festival, which was originally founded on Baker Beach in San Francisco in 1986, is now known as one of the wildest camping events of the year and has attracted A-listers including Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Will Smith.

This year, 80,000 people have forked out $575 on tickets to be part of the self-reliant community that builds Black Rock City — with the event kicking off on Sunday, August 27 and lasting until Monday, September 4.

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Revellers, known as Burners, are expected to bring “all they need to survive” in the harsh desert where conditions are “often violent an unpredictable” and ice is the only thing sold in the temporary city.

During the nine-day festival, 1,500 camps will be set up across the playa, the dried-up land Black Rock City lies on, and each hosts its own events.

Campers can take part in arts and craft events, yoga, meditation, and friendly ping pong tournaments, but there’s truly something for everyone at Black Rock City — and that includes the more raunchy revellers looking to have some erotic fun.

Last year, many dressed up in armoured bikinis or ditched their clothes altogether in favour of body paint to head to the all-night raves.

But there was also plenty of opportunity for some after-hours group sex, frolicking in communal showers and black-light BDSM sessions.

The notorious “Orgy Dome”, which has been at Burning Man since 2003, even made a return to offer a “safe, consensual, sex-positive, inclusionary and exploratory environment”.

Inside the dome bodies writhe around on mattresses with one Reddit user revealing it’s usually “occupied by couples, with some threesomes and moresomes”.

Consent is key at the sexually charged site though, with the Burning Man website stating: “You are responsible for getting verbal consent before engaging.”

One fan of the Orgy Dome told Cosmopolitan: “Verbal consent is necessary to begin play with other groups and to introduce new activities.

“If you ask if you can play with a couple, you’d still need to ask, ‘Can I touch your breasts?’ ‘Can I go down on you?’ ‘Can I f*** you both in the butt?’ Consent is an active process and can be removed at any point.”

That doesn’t mean things don’t get out of control though, with one year seeing a bloke having such an intense session he ended up breaking his penis.

And not everyone is a fan of the racy dome. Speaking about her experience on the Sex Within an Hour Podcast, OnlyFans model Brie Teresi described it as “disgusting”.

She said: “It was so disgusting in there, there were people doing like all disgusting things.

“It smelled so bad and I was like I am not doing this and the girl was not doing this so we were just watching and we were cracking up because it looked so ridiculous.”

But the Orgy Dome is still expected to return to the temporary city this year, where the theme is “Animalia”.

And there are plenty of other sexual events on the schedule too.

Women looking for an arousing experience can head to the Pussy Day Spa, which is offering ladies a “body wash and inappropriate full body massage with happy ending”.

Meanwhile, gay, bisexual or “curious” men can head over to the Down Low Club to take part in some “man-to-man” play.

Other raunchy events this year will include a party at the Naked Tiki Bar where partygoers could be in with a chance of “getting lei’d”, as well as the regular “shoot your balls off” events where “the title says it all”.

And to finish the day, free-spirited Burners can take part in the “sunset naked run and howl”.

The nine-day party will come to an end with the traditional symbolic burning of a large wooden effigy and campers will then have to leave the desert as they found it as they return back to their normal lives.