I'll start this by staying, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a lawyer, I'm not a sales person, and I'm not a medical device medical engineer with FDA approval/regulations specialty, although I did use to live with one for over 10 years, so I have some understanding of that FDA process while not being a specialist on it either (but neither are most who talk about it). Before I continue, I'll point out that multiple people who post about HBOT and call themselves doctors are not medical doctors with medical degrees, and therefore their medical background or opinion should be on the same level as mine. You should trust what I say no more than what they say, but hopefully I'm giving enough reasoned information below that matches what's currently happening in the US market, that you can consider my points as hopefully valid.
Now that this is out of the way, I'll summarize what I've read and seen, partially to help others, as well as encourage someone who actually knows this stuff inside and out, to tell me if I'm wrong, why, and show me supporting evidence like clear FDA regulations and how they apply to what I'm going to explain below. I will however say right now that I will only consider "you're wrong" opinions with clear supporting evidence in a well written reply with references and ignore you if you say "I know this stuff, but I don't have time to write the details as to why I'm right and you're wrong".
Summary:
way too many people post in the US that soft chambers can only be 1.3 ATA at most in the US
incidentally all of them I've talked to myself, happen to sell/resell soft chambers, and from what I saw all of them sell/resell soft chanbers made by US manufacturers. Potential conflict of interest obviously.
my understanding is that US manufacturers of soft chambers must make such chambers to meet one FDA approved use, and there is only a single FDA approved use of soft chambbers, namely to transport a patient with decompression sickness to a hard chamber capable of higher pressures (treating DCS can require pressures of 3 ATA or more, which soft chambers are not capable of). If you have heard of double blind placebo controlled studies, this is where those come in. They make sure not only the treatment is not otherwise harmful, does help for the intended use, and helps more than spontaneous healing due to luck or people healing themselves by the power of their mind (if you think this is a joke, it is not, look up "placebo effect"). The premise for those studies is sound, but they are slow and expensive.
Whoever paid for that FDA study to get soft chambers approved for it likely had to pay millions of dollars and spend over a year to get this approved, that's how the FDA works. If you want to add a new FDA approved use, or change the chamber pressure to 1.5 ATA, you need to do a new study which can cost again about a year and millions of dollars. Few companies have that time and money.
there are 14 FDA approved uses of HBOT in hard chambers, and covered by insurance, and they are listed in this page. Odds are none of those are what you are trying to do, or if they were you'd likely go to an approved hard chamber facility and get those treatments and reimbursed by insurance: https://www.hyperbaricmedicalsolutions.com/blog/hyperbaric-oxygen-insurance-coverage
Most uses of hbot by people looking at buying their own chambers for home use, are off label. Off label means using an FDA approved drug or equipment for a medical use other than one that was part of a tested and approved use tested by a study. It is actually a huge loophole in the system, it allows using just about any drug or equipment for any ultimately other use that wasn't properly tested as part of a rigorous study as described above. For instance if you are using trazodone, an anti depressant, for sleep, or gapabentin (an anti nerve pain drug) again for sleep, or even seroquel (an anti bipolar drug) for sleep, those are all off label uses and none of those 3 drugs were rigorously tested to work as sleep drugs, although many doctors know by now they work well for that use too and prescribe them to some patients for deeper/longer sleep.
Back to HBOT, my point is that by definition no off label use is FDA approved, but the good news is that the FDA does not prevent off label use.
In turn however, this means the 1.3 ATA limit on soft chambers for early DCS patient transport, does not apply since this is not what off label patients are using them for. However, US manufacturers apparently can only build soft chambers for an approved use, it's the only one, and it's limited to 1.3 ATA, hence the 1.3 ATA limit.
But this is where things get interesting: in the US (not true of Canada for instance), the FDA does not currently prevent a patient from buying a soft chamber made by a non US manufacturer, it does not prevent anyone from using any soft chamber at any given pressure including pressures above 1.3 ATA (you can make the point that there are some limited risks especially at 2.0 ATA and above for uninformed patients treating themselves without doctor supervision, so the FDA might want to regulate that use, but as of right now it hasn't been enough of a problem for them ot do so). The FDA does not prevent importing your own soft chamber capable of 1.5 ATA+ from a non US vendor, and from what I can tell it does not seem illegal for US resellers to sell non US made 1.5ATA+ chambers in the US to US buyers. That last part I'm not 100% certain about, but I know multiple US companies that sell them and if it's somehow not quite legal, that's ultimately their problem and risk not yours.
So there you go, this is why you can buy and use a 1.5 ATA+ soft chamber in the US, and why many resellers or US manufacturers seem to keep repeating it's not legal, when it totally seems to be for now. I'll now repeat that if somehow it were to be not super legal for US resellers to sell those chambers, as a buyer, do you really care as long as you can buy the chamber you want and need? Obviously my own answer is no :) In Canada, some users have found that they cannot get a soft chamber shipped to their home, but they can get one sent to the US and drive it across the border themselves. That's more of a pain obviously.
I have seen other posts talking about non FDA standards related to construction, fire risk, maybe electrical norms (like anything sold in US is supposed to be UL certified). I am certain those chinese made chambers were not tested to meet each and every of those non medical, non FDA certifications, but apparently it's not against the law to sell, buy, or use them either, or if it is, no one seems to care or enforce that, so you can decide if you care yourself. I'll point out that a lot of stuff sold today on amazon or elsewhere also does not meet some of those other regulations either, or maybe they do or even exceed them, but they never paid to get certified to the US test/norm.
The one thing you should hopefully care about is "is that soft chamber going to burst?", which would be a catastrophic failure that can cause injury and potentially really damage your ears if it happens at the wrong time at high pressure. This is where you have to decide how much you trust each product. Whether it's US made or not, does not make me feel that much better, and honestly a lot of "US made" stuff is really made in china anyway, just saying.
The truth is that some Chinese manufacturers do care to make properly engineered and tested stuff, it's the same than when I was sourcing computer and electronic hardware from there, some was utter crap and would fail because it was cheap. Others were well made and tested to be durable by companies that did rigorous engineering and testing, using chinese testing norms that were equivalent or even superior to the US ones.
The tricky part is to find which chinese companies you can trust, and which ones you should not. I used my experience in dealing with those vendors and knowing what questions to ask to get a good feel for my own purchase. Whether you want to trust my experience, research and feel, that's entirely up to you. I'm sharing the work I've done and the points to consider, so you can redo that work for yourself if you wish, but don't simply assume that if you're buying form a US manufacturer, everything will automatically be ok. There are enough clear examples of the opposite. I would say that it's true that if you get a 1.3 ATA only chamber, it's easier to meet those specs and limit the risks, but you're also settling for what I consider a lesser chamber compared to a 1.5 to 2.0 ATA capable chamber. It's your call at this point.
There are US made 1.3 ATA chambers that have failed catastrophically (exploded). There have been fires in hard chambers with people dying because they couldn't get out, and the operator was not there to watch them and let them out. I have heard from a practitioner I worked with, of 1.45ATA soft chambers that failed slowly (leakage in seams or zippers that prevented reaching full pressure), but nothing catastrophic. I have seen 2 vendors of $8000 2.0 ATA chambers on meubon that sold chambers with no reviews and did not fill me with confidence (they are listed in my previous blog linked below). Those 2 Meubon listed chambers made me nervous enough that I would not use them and go in them even if I got them for free.
So applying all of the above, this is what I did to get my own chamber:
I'm willing to believe 1.3ATA is sufficient treatment for some off label uses
I'm fairly convinced that for most of those treatments, they would work better and faster at 1.5 or 1.7 ATA
Some likely work better and faster at 2.0 ATA
I have read some opinions, that may be valid, that some specific treatment might work better at 1.5 ATA than 2.0 ATA. This is just a feeling, without a rigorous FDA double blind study, anyone who says anything either way (including me), is just guessing. I'll add that some of that advice came from someone who isn't a medical doctor with a medical degree, so it's jut an opinion based on personal research from public sources that should have the same weight as if you or I did that same research from similar sources.
I personally do not believe any off label treatment I care about needs or will work better/faster with more than 2.0 ATA
I found exactly one soft chamber that does 2.0 ATA and from a manufacturer I'm willing to trust after talking to them and their competitor for several weeks, and asking them tough questions to know whether they knew what they were talking about, and whether the had rigorous testing to back up their sales claim. Olive won over Hugo/Lannx, and if you are in the US you can get the 2.0 ATA one from the US distributor AHS / affordablehyperbaricsolutions@gmail.com
If you don't think you need 2.0 ATA, or fully trust a soft chamber to do 2.0 ATA safely, don't you want to use a 2.5 ATA tested chamber at 1.5 ATA if that's your target pressure, instead of a 1.5 only ATA chamber that is reaching its design limits each time you use it?
This is the Olive 2.0 chamber I got for myself:
For the rest, please read my previous blog on chambers and how I compared them. I also list 3 1.5 ATA only chambers you can pick from and that I would reasonably trust. The price is similar enough though that the only reason I would not buy the Olive 2.0 ATA chamber is if you don't like the car seat belt straps you need to use in addition to the zippers and that are needed for extra structural integrity. You can use them as a single user without help, but they add I would say 20 to 30 seconds of work getting in and out of the chamber without help.
I will repeat this point because it's important: in engineering it's always better if you can to get a product that will exceed your requirements so that there is more of a design buffer between your use and the engineering limits. In my own use, I may end up using my 2.0 ATA Olive chamber at 1.7 ATA, haven't full decided yet.
Here is the previous blog: Learning about HBOT/Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy I was referring to. I would also repeat from that previous blog that aside from the actual chamber safety, you should very much care that the concentrator and compressor can deliver at least 7lpm of 95% O2 at your target pressure. I will say right now that too many products (even some 1.3 ATA chambers when OMG, it's not hard to deliver at that low pressure) fail to deliver the right amount of airflow, or if they give you the airflow, they fails to deliver enough O2 percentage at that airflow level.
So there you go, hope this all helps, good luck on your selection and purchase.
After writing this, I did find two resources people cite as problematic:
NFPA-55 - You can't have bulk oxygen (generally classified as more than 13,000 cubic feet) in residential areas or housed indoors: this is not relevant to chambers that use O2 concentrators since they make that O2 on the fly and none is stored in your house
So this year is a bit special, 2 EDCs! I indeed went to EDC Mexico as a last minute thing, and it is a pretty good scaled down version of EDC Vegas. It was a lot of fun, but of course it doesn't really compare with the real EDC, honestly I think nothing in the world, does.
In the last years, a lot of people are now camping by EDC, which helps the traffic somewhat:
That said, I've heard the shiftpods in CampEDC, are a joke, and that the heat is unbearable in them despite some AC that can't keep up with the Vegas sun. To be honest, it always felt like a bad idea to me, and I guess RVs are probably the only thing that are somewhat reasonable and indeed save you the daily 1h+ commute in and out. I still went with that using the premium shuttles which kept the travel time to 1H or less, but they are not cheap ($250-ish per person). The regular shuttles are half price, but the lines are much longer...
Great to start with this reminder:
yes to plur and good vibes!
This is what the craziness looks during the day:
but of course that's nothing from the magic at night:
So, let's go back and look around:
The Grounds:
Few people can ever say they saw all of EDC, because even if you try there is a lot, and if you count Passport that few people have access to, all the VIP areas, or the big Skydeck area for Kinetic Fields, with its own grounds and attractions, or the Artist/DJ Village, few people have access to all of it. And even if you do, it's easy to miss some small corner somewhere or even something not that small like No Man's Land by wasteland:
The VIP areas were cool:
this rain/water maze was definitely fun
nice raised area by Kinetic Fields
Passport is also a nice area as always and good vantage point of the craziness:
great views from there
Of course you'll also find random stuff like video games:
Downtown EDC was moved, but the square area in the middle is lots of fun:
kandi casino was awesome again
More nice areas:
And more:
Plenty of vendors. Most were fine, but I wasn't a huge fan of the vaping one looking to hook more people to nicotine, and I don't overly mind the pot vendor(s) since honestly at least that provides some benefits to some and isn't nearly as addictive:
So many rides again, too bad the lines were so long...
yes, you can get help :)
As always, a good way to see EDC, is from higher up, and the ferris wheels are the best way to do it:
Fireworks and Drones
Of course fireworks are one of the best things from EDC, 01:41 every night this year:
Fireworks video here:
The People
I often tell people, especially in Europe, that one of the things I really enjoy about US festivals, is the amount of costumes and other cool outfits. Obviously I do my best to participate to that trned:
TFSF Group picture:
Of course, running into friends is a good part of the fun:
and fun totems, 'this is the way'
I've made some great friends from EDC/Dreamstate shows, some are engineers like me :)
Hi Ulrich! :)
TFSF Crew
Kandi is serious business :)
More TFSF Crew
The Insomniac entertainers were fantastic as always:
check out the costumes!
Pixie again! Much love.
And it was so much fun to be able to meet favorite DJs as always:
Got to see Daxson 4 times in 2 weeks :)
haha, normally I clean my lens better than this :)
Kepik, the new 7 lions!
But anyway, let's get on with the festival:
Day #1
Just like last years, took an uber on the first day to get there early since the shuttles get stuck in commuter traffic on fridays, and went to enjoy the grounds. The shuttles were nice, but I don't understand why the first shuttle got moved to 18:30 instead of 18:00. Taking the 18:00 shuttle allowed to arrive for 19:00 and not miss the first set, leaving at 18:30 guarantees arriving late :-
interesting new church design for Kinetic Fields
Quantum Valley was again fantastic this year
Paul did a nice set this year
seeing GO again just a few days after Rong/Malta
Video Summary:
Day #2
Day #2 was almost mostly spent at Quantum Valley, because trance! :)
Great to see Miyuki rise all the way to EDC, congrats!
seeing sunset is always lovely
Video Summary:
Day #3
Day 3 was time to roam around and go check out everything else. 15 stages total counting the art cars, that's a lot! (actually I think there were more stages if you count passport and others).
Made sure not to miss Seven Lions at Circuit Grounds, epic set!
Then Cosmic Meadows:
And finished the night all the way to sunrise at Quantum Valley:
Stayed mostly until the end, always nice to see sunrise on the way out:
Video Summary:
Should you go? Would I go Back?
At this point, note that this text is mostly the same as last years, since it's still valid :)
EDC Vegas is probably the most impressive EDM Night Festival in the world. Tomorrowland is a rival but it's not a night festival as more challenges I'm not as much a fan of (never mind of course the distance for me or the fact that you mostly can't buy tomorrowland tickets, while you can for EDC).
Like previous times:
Decors are just fantastic, along with so many performers. That's the best part about EDC. Even better now that I know and recognize some fo the performers (Hi Pixie)
Like other insomniac festivals, all the staff truly cares and goes all out. Many small details that get sometimes missed elsewhere, are usually flawless. I'll even add that actually they are the most detail oriented, over achieving people I have seen. The amount of small details I absolutely do notice, how every corner of the racetrack is used for decors, the amount of light strings and LEDs, across ridiculous distances, and it just works all night, even night !?!? I have no words.
This year again, security was more than reasonable as usual, thank you. Enough police onsite to help keep things safe, I personally like that.
19:00 to 05:30 is 10:30h of partying for 3 days, lots of fun! Actually first day does start at 17:00 (Cosmic Meadows only), and the next 2 days that used to start at 17:00 do not anymore, but I'm sure that for those at Camp EDC, there are plenty of parties there.
So many free carnival rides, lots of fun, but the lines were too long for most, wasn't able to justify spending the time in line to enjoy them.
So many stages also, 15 if you count art cars this year!
Is it worth flying across the world for? Yes, absolutely, there is nothing else like this on earth.
Conclusion/Other thoughts
Thoughts about this year:
Insomniac: please give exact GPS pin locations for the projected shuttle stops. Sometimes they are 1 mile away from the fake address given and it really makes a difference when picking hotels
Insomniac: why were the first shuttles moved to 18:30? Please put them back to 18:00 so that you can take that and not miss the first set.
Insomniac: I'm sure you read the comments on people with a very bad experiences and serious medical issues (heat exhaustion) related in Camp EDC. Given the cost of those, please make sure they have proper shade, burning man style, or it's not going to work and continue to ruin the experiences of people who can't deal with that amount of heat in the day.
Insomniac: Quantum Valley was absoutely gorgeous this year again, way better than all stages from dreamstate queen mary combined. Please bring back upside down U megastructures for dreamstate.
I got used to the 2 day only trance lineup and going around to enjoy everything else on day 3. All in all that's actually a good thing.
Moving Quantum Valley next to Kinetic Fields and the shuttles entrance/exit was sooo convenient for me. I'm of course biased about my own preference there, but loved that :)
EDC continued to add new art installations, removed a few, moved stages around, kept things fresh. I liked that.
I'll repeat that all the insomniac staff and insomniac entertainers were top notch as always. I mean seriously they were jumping and smiling all night each time I saw them. I know it's their job, but kudos to them for having so much positive energy for so long.
The toxic waste depot in the tunnel where pixel forest tunnel used to be, was a very cool new installation
The visuals on all stages were top notch again. Nothing beats EDC there.
Thank you to everyone at the insomniac team, all the performers, all the volunteers who put so much effort into making so many details right all over the place, with the great result that we all got to enjoy..
Just like EDC 2023 only had 2 days of trance this year at Quantum Valley, EDC 2024 on, it was nice to have another Dreamstate Pre-Party at Area15. Area15 was better this year than last year, they worked out some of the kinks from last year, which was good.
This year, we got to get in via the normal area15 entrance, which is prettier and more fun:
cool entrance
This year had a great lineup, and some very interesting B2Bs:
Great to see Daxson again just a few days after just a few days in Malta
Miyuki!
lovely to see thorgodofbass again
good crowd
Rinaly!
:)
Then we had cool B2Bs:
Then the night ended with a unique B2B between Blastoyz and Infected Mushroom, I have most of the set recorded below:
And here is a video summary of the rest of the night:
Illuminarium Las Vegas is next door to Area15, and being there a little bit early for the Dreamstate Area15 show I had just enough time to see the show, which is a nice space movie projected on a lot of walls. Cool place:
Rong Events is not new at festivals, but it was their first time organizing one in Malta, and it went really well. I think the best way you can summarize the festival is that it's a Malta version of Unkonscious in Thailand:
mostly by the beach/nice weather
some regular clubs and some beach clubs
multiple locations (4 total)
optional boat party
more intimate, easier to meet DJs smaller, scale festival, more cozy (like lumi used to be, but less today as it has grown)
2 stages at most. No major fomo of missing lots of sets every hour :)
plenty of partying at night with cool lights, lasers, fireworks (unlike lumi which is over 90% during the day in blazing sun and often with insufficient shade)
this is not a competitor to lumi, this is what lumi likely used to be when it was still small an more intimate, and before it became the maybe over big event it is today. Some will prefer the craziness of 4 stages 11H straight at lumi (puting aside the sound bleed and other issues with 2 stages) at lumi, while others will prefer 1 or 2 stages and less running around. To each their own.
Unkonscious was 6 days and more spread out (longer distances, up to 2H between places), Rong Malta was only 4 days and places were 30mn away at most (from Cafe del mar to Uno or the boat party pier).
Was 4 days not as good as 6? Oh boy no, 4 days was plenty. I had so much fun and was so dead at the end. Honestly 6 days of Unkonscious was almost gruesome, no I was good with 4. The 2 festivals of course do not compete that much because of how far away they are. Even for me in California, Thailand is still farther away by plane than Malta, and for Europeans Malta is of course a much easier hop.
The one slight downside of both festivals is it's a bit harder to figure out where to stay or whether to change hotels. In the case of Unkonscious, you had to move at least once (from Pattaya to Bangkok). In the case of Rong Open Air Festival Malta, things were close enough that you could stay anywhere and use bolt to get around within 20 to 30mn at most, not bad. The festival did come with a hotel package (Bora Bora hotel), but in hindsight it was probably not the best choice as most things happened at Uno, and I found the $150 "booking" fee in the package (added to the hotel price) a bit steeper than necessary.
Malta Day 1, Thursday: Bora Bora Hotel Pool Party: 15:00 to 22:00
Day 1 was easy if you stayed at the hotel, it was right there. If you were lucky enough with your room (I was not), you could see the stage and just enjoy the show from your patio, but either way you could just open the sliding door and enjoy from your room for a while if you wanted. The stage was simple but worked, and we narrowly avoided rain (just a tiny bit), so it was a good time up to the 22:00 curfew (not everyone in the hotel was part of the festival)
reorder closed that evening at 22:00
Video Summary of Day 1:
Malta Day 2, Friday: Uno Malta: 16:00 to 04:00
Day 2 was a combination of day party and night party at Uno, about 20mn away from Bora Bora:
the bars were well equipped
Our new swiss festival lover friends
Daxson threw a great set
finally got to see Alex Morph play again
and finally got to take this picture with him with an outfit I had gotten ready years ago
Always nice to see Lange, I've listened to him since the ASOT 100 days
Paul Van Dyk went next
and he graciously met the crowd after his set
Rob and Anna both from Dublin, got re-united after some 20 years :)
last time I saw Dave Pearse was 20 years ago in Ibiza
Scott Project ended the night
Video Summary of Day 2:
Malta Day 3, Saturday: Cafe Del Mar
Malta being the new Ibiza, they have all the famous Ibiza clubs, including of course Cafe Del Mar. And their Cafe del Mar is also absolutely gorgerous
surviving in the sun :)
our lovely new swiss friends
Woohoo, we got 2 more sets from Ruben
don't laugh, so many pictures, so many festivals, I have to keep up real time, or there is no way I can keep doing these reports before it's 3 months later and no one cares ;) I actually finished writing this festival report in the shuttles to/from EDC Vegas 4 days later ;)
And finally came the magical time of sunset
magical!
and to finsh the day party, a few bonus fireworks!
Uno had 2 stages, and easy to stage hop. Metta & Glyde were on stage 2:
And then, got so lucky to get another performance of gouryella, I was in heaven:
I wasn't prepared for it, so the first 10mn were hand recorded, and then I managed to do this for the last 50mn
the visuals are always the fun part for me
So, I really really love Gouryella and recorded the whole set (shaking goes away after 10mn):
Next, was key4050, John O Callaghan and Bryan Kearney:
Maria Healy on stage 2:
and the night went on until 04:00, but for me it was time for a bit of sleep :)
Video Summary of Day 3:
Malta Day 4, Sunday: Boat Party
The boat party was hard to get to, each time I looked for it online, it wasn't for sale, and then it got sold out quickly. The boat was not super big, so space was limited. It was nice and cozy and enjoyable to boat around the island and see its forts:
Anselli opened
Markus Schulz played most of the trip, nice set
nice views along the way
Liam Wilson took us home after Markus
Video Summary of Day 4 Boat Party:
Malta Day 4, Sunday Part 2: Uno Day Party
After the boat, the party was supposed to be at our hotel, Bora Bora, but when we got back there, we found out it had been moved to Uno. To be fair, Uno was a better club, but it would have been nice to have the party at our hotel and watch it from our room and hear it while we were packing our luggage to promptly get out sunday night/monday morning for an early flight out. Packed all the luggage and took a cab to Uno to catch the end of the day party (unfortunately missed some sets both due to the boat party and then the party being moved away from our hotel):
hi Craig!
Sander Van Doorn
To be honest, it got nicer as things got cooler, and at 22:00 the rest of Uno opened for the followup night party.
Malta Day 4, Sunday Part 3: Uno Night Party
So technically it was supposed to be part 3 (from Bora Bora to Uno), but ultimately it was a Uno for both. Liam Wilson whom we had just seen on the boat, opened the evening party:
Christina Novelli took over after that for a banging set:
she took time to meet many fans afterwards
FactorB, OMG, what a set. I wasn't ready for it, didn't get to record it outside of a few clips, not sure it was recorded, but pure joy it was:
he also went to meet the crowd afterwards
Then Aly and Fila did a lovely melody and dreamy set:
he also nicely met his fans afterwards
Giuseppe Ottaviani took over:
And I had just missed Maddix in SF because I had alrady gone to Europe but got to see his set in Malta:
And Will Atkinson closed the night. I was only able to stay for half his set due to having to run to the airport and catch the flight back home. As always, he was full of energy:
And boy, just like that, it was over. It went by so fast, but at the same time I was *sooo* exhausted at the end, of course with a huge smile on my face. Barely made it to the 2 planes home, and caught up on sleep there.
Video Summary of Day 4:
Pricing
The festival itself was reasonably priced, a few other things, less so. Random pictures that will answer your pricing questions:
merch was not cheap
alcohol was 'festival priced' :), water half the price of lumi
food was mostly ok, only downside is you couldn't buy any food anywhere without wristband money
How about the festival price? $188 for 4 days and all the parties (not including boat party) was honestly a very good price. The bora bora hotel package was overpriced in my opinion though. $250/night for a room here that ultimately wasn't well located for most parties except the first day, was not the best in hindsight, and I was not impressed by the additional $103 booking fee for the hotel only, which was totally non refundable or changeable (I booked the package early trusting that the hotel was the place to be, and when I realized later that not so much, I was told I was stuck with that package and no hotel refunds were possible, not even after losing the booking fee). That is honestly the only thing I regret getting, but the festival itself was super well priced, definitely fantastic value.
General Admission Festival Tickets 2024 - GA | Second Release: $188.28 ×2
BORA BORA HOTEL - Superior Triple Balcony Urban View May 8 - 13 2024: $1,035.52
Subtotal $1,412.08
General Admission | Second Release - Booking Fee $18.82
Superior Triple Balcony Urban View - Booking Fee $103.55
General Admission | Second Release - Booking Fee $18.82
Total: $1,553.27
Other Thoughts
Even though it was the first year, the festival sold out VIP and things like the boat party. Even regular tickets, it felt that they couldn't have sold a lot more without getting into capacity issues, so all it all, that was great: they sold plenty of tickets, hopefully made money, but not enough to have it packed and uncomfortable for us. I also give them credit for not selling more tickets than they had room for for things like VIP and boat party, that shows they care about the experience first, not making more money at all cost.
I do realize that after telling you I had a great time, if you all go and the organizers don't cap tickets, the event will get over crowded and less fun. I however do have reasonable hope they will do the right thing if this happens, and the good news is how many trance festivals we can choose from this year, so hopefully it will spread the attendee load and allow them to stay reasonably small and intimate.
Parting thoughts:
I went to this festival because after my terrible experience at lumi last year (I totally understand most people did have a good time there last year), I asked you all for suggestions and you gave this event, thank you. I had so much more fun than at lumi, loved the better variety, a lot less sun and more night, better food options, better organizers and much more. Sure, it didn't have 4 tracks every hour of plenty of music I would miss since I can only be at one stage at once anyway. Also, lumi had at least one stage that was terrible due to small size and sound bleed (sunset) and another one that was so so depending on the direction of the wind and the smell of the bathrooms right next to it. Honestly, I didn't miss any of that, one of 2 stages was a lot easier, and not dealing with the lumi "the customer is the enemy" bar bouncers security team, was very refreshing.
tap water in malta is supposed to be drinkable, but locals seem not to trust it somehow. There were no water fountains or refill stations at the festivals, just bottled water for sale. I know we are spoiled by Insomniac and all its US events for this, making sure everyone hydrates and limiting pointless plastic bottle waste is honestly a win win. You could refill water from bathrooms if you wanted, but given the uncertainty of the water safety, official water fountains would be better. That said, bottled water was half the price of lumi, and you could get other water if you really wanted, or get in and out anyway.
yes, in and outs were allowed at each venue every day, which was much appreciated and not true of many other festivals. Ok, maybe for the boat party, in and out required swimming in the ocean :)
The required wristband money was unfortunately the only big minus for me. While some festivals call it cashless and for our convenience, the ones that truly mean it take contactless credit cards and phone tap to pay (all US festivals I've been to, including eclipse festival that had optional wristband money, but also accepted contactless credit cards. Other festivals like lumi also do it. Even lumi, for all the issues I have with it, does do the right thing and take contactless credit cards and pay by phone. Unfortunately this one did not and required loading money on a wristband and trusting them to be a bank, which I don't really want to trust any festival to be. Being a bank is hard, and pretty much every festival gets it wrong in various ways. Getting money back was apparently possible but requited special work and only if it was more than $5. This is just extra work and worries that are not needed for a festival.
Security was top notch, more below...
Let's talk about security. The security staff was not a bunch of untrained bar bouncers. They looked like commando style military and I'm not saying this in a bad way. They looked highly trained and did a great job looking over the event, making sure people were safe and exercising restraint if they had to get involved. They looked friendly and were always helpful. That was about as good as I've ever seen anywhere. As a bonus, they didn't have pointless over the top searches focussed on stealing your sunscreen or beauty products, or tampons (yes, you probably know what other festival I'm referring to)
If you think this is a small deal, it's not. Security is a huge part of whether festivals are both safe and enjoyable. Achieving both at the same time is no small feat and the Malta team used by Rong was stellar. Thank you!
A comparison against every other festival wouldn't be warranted or useful, but I hope this helps you decide how to use your time and money since neither are infinite:
vs Unkonscious Thailand: they are not identical but they are similar in many ways, go to the one that is closest to you and matches your vacation schedule. Thailand is cheaper once you are there, but flying there from outside of Asia will obviously cost you more.
vs Unkonscious Croatia: hard to compare against a festival that hasn't happened yet, but my guess is that Unkonscious Croatia will also be an enjoyable smaller scale festival like the Thailand version, and going to either would not be a mistake :) I can't go to that one, it conflicts with another festival I'm already going to.
vs Euphoria weekender: it's happening 2 days from now as I'm writing this. I wish I could go but after 8 days of festivals in less than 2 weeks, my body really really needs rest :) From what I've seen Euphoria is lower key and a bit cheaper even, and should also be a great time. I think people look at it as "less commercial" but honestly rong malta didn't feel commercial unlike let's say Tomorrowland that was all about the money and where they apparently mostly stopped carrying about the festival goers and turned into a big money machine
vs Captured Malta: that one hasn't happened yet either. My guess is that Captured will be some place between Euphoria weekender and Rong Malta. I'm going there in September.
vs Lumi: you can't really compare them that much, you can read the lumi bits I wrote above already. Lumi has a lot more trance, many more people (too many at times for my taste) and unfortunately made some very questionable choices in the last years, I'll leave it at that outside of saying that I absolutely do not feel welcome there anymore if you don't know the details.
vs dreamstate socal: they are just way too different for me to even compare them, I love both for difference reasons. Dreamstate wins for the way more lights and costumes if you like that, but you cannot call dreamstate intimate
Should you go? Would I go Back?
First, I need to state that Malta is a very cool country to visit. If you can, spend at least an extra 3 days to learn about the country's history over the many years, and its central location in the mediteranean, which is the cause for its rich history. It's a very unique mix of a population that speaks an old arab dialect that is written with roman characters, and is mostly Christian. If that's not unique, I don't know what is :)
Malta is not the same level of cheap than Thailand, but overall it was reasonably priced. Cheaper than Ibiza which it is aiming to be a competitor for.
it was a day and night festival, and had plenty of night hours with pretty lights and lasers. Night owl me was happy.
It's a smaller festival, not meant to be compared with the big ones, and that was totally ok with me. It's a nice change of pace to have something smaller where you don't walk so far every day between many stages and miss many sets every hour. Don't take me wrong, I'm writing these last sentences from the plane back from EDC Vegas 5 days later, and nothing compares to EDC Vegas and the insanity of that experience, but you can only take that once a year at most ;) I really do welcome more chill festivals, EDC is as awesome as it is really gruesome and takes a long time to recover from :)
Just like Unkonscious, the organizers care and it shows. As I write this, they already sent a survey link. It may seem like a little thing, but festivals that do not also say in that process "we don't really are if we did well or could have done better" and a few I won't name even give the feel of "you should feel thankful that you even were able to attend our festival". Obviously Rong did the opposite across the board, it doesn't mean everything was perfect, it never is, but they sure tried hard and want to continue to do better. Good on them!
I hope they will read my report and consider my suggestion to drop the wristband money requirement. If they allow contactless credit cards and pay by phone, it will honestly be perfect.
And if Alessandra Roncone came, you know it's a good party :)
Alessandra!
Left around 03:35 (25mn before the end), went back to Bora Bora to pick up luggage (hotel totally in the wrong direction for airport, as stated it was a mistake to stay there), drove back down to airport and arrived around 04:30 for a 05:55 flight out. Lufthansa as always managed to be terrible and after refusing to assign us seats on the phone for 2 days, also had a 48H computer outage (yes really) that prevented online checking, so we had no seats and got the last 2 random middle seats on the plane while being told we should be lucky to have seats at all because the plane was oversold again (same deal as flyoug out of Cluj after Untold last year). F you Lufthansa, this repeated incompetence and total lack of respect for the customer is unacceptable (they couldn't care less if we missed our connecting flight to SFO after that or that we could at least get a window seat to lay our head and attempt to sleep a bit until the longer flight FRA-SFO leaving at noon, that one with Condor). Ironically while Condor is kind of a new long haul Ryanair, they were much better than Lufthansa on this trip...
Thank you all of you I met there, came to say hi, all the DJs, and the organizers. You made this time fantastic, thank you!
Initially going to Delphi didn't seem like a fun drive, just going to Olympia was already a fair trek, but I didn't originally factor it as a day trip from Athens with a tour bus (to avoid the 4H+ of driving). But due to limited time, I picked from getyourguide, which offered 2 tours, one that stopped 2H at Arachova and said pretty much nothing about what Arachova was or why it was a good idea to stop there.
As a result of the very poor getyourguide site (and you had one job), I picked what they called the "most popular" day trip which was indeed to Delphi only. Once on the trip, driving through Arachova and realizing how beautiful it was and why it was on the other tour that I didn't pick because I had no idea, now I had deep regret. Thankfully I was able to work something out to rescue to the day, do both Delphi and Arachova (With 2H in Arachova), and still catch the bus back to Athens.
Let's start with Delphi, though. It was another one of those pretty impressive places back in the day, of which there is only so much left today, so you have to read the descriptions and use your imagination along with the audioguide:
found a beautiful and probably poisonous spider on the way ;)
For comparison, thi is what the site used to look like back in the day:
The highlight was the top forum that is still in good shape:
From there, the rest higher up was apparently closed, but I managed to miss that and went to the top:
the top arena was not well maintained and probably hadn't been for a while
From there, I felt I saw all that could be seen, so I went to check out the museum which had a decent collection:
Once done with the museum, took a cab to nearby beautiful Arachova:
super colorful church
Lots of yummy and cheap shopping:
Cute little museum inside town:
The town was full of friendly cats
and after about 2H in town, walked to the bus pickup area, for the IG crowd ;)
and then, longish ride back to Athens, but so happy I didn't have to drive :)
π
2024-05-02 01:01
in Greece2024, Monuments, Museums
Day #2 in Athens was to go through museums, and of course Acropolis Museum was a major one to see. It was very well built and layed out, and looked well done. It was nowhere close in size, but it was Louvre quality.
storing black powder and ammunition there during the war
turned out to be a big mistake and responsible for most of the damage seen today
The 2nd of the 2 major museums in Athens is indeed the Archeological Museum. It's a bit outside the main town area and unfortunately due to orthodox easter that week, it was only half open, which was pretty disappointing (it was not a national holiday, just not enough staff showed up for work to staff all the rooms, sigh...)
We was available of the collection, though, was first rate:
π
2024-05-02 01:01
in Greece2024, Monuments, Museums
The Panatheanic Stadium was rebuilt for the 2004 greece olympics, and it does look quite good. Much better than the original site at Olympia which wasn't very stadium-like by our current standards :)
Athens had been on my TODO list for a long time of course, and while Rick Steves recommends 3 full days to do a good visit, it became clear after the first day that most everything else would fit on the 2nd day, so that freed up the 3rd day for a day trip to [Delphi and Arachova, the latter city was actually super fun and pretty (blog clickme)|].
So, I'll start by mentioning cabs. They have a monopoly and too many are crooks that refuse to use their meters. If you step in one, they'll decide how much they want to charge you (usually double or triple the meter rate). Also, they hang out outside monuments and wait for "customers" to fall into their trap:
The only way around is to uber which calls a cab, about half will refuse to take you unless you turn off uber and give them the same flat fee, but eventually one will be honest. Still, pain in the ass...
Athens Day1: Parthenon, Agora and Roman Agora, Pssyri, and Kerameikos
Day #1 hit all the spots on the Parthenon combo ticket:
Aacropolis
theater of dionysus
ancient agora
roman forum
temple olympian zeus
library of Hadrian,
keramikos cemetery
Some of the sights are on their own page, starting with the obvious:
This is where I'll admit that it was only 16:00 and therefore there were 4 more hours of museums that could been done, but due to travels, lingering cold and short nights, the day ended here. That said, still time for dinner:
and got to learn more about the olympic games. You do get a reasonable distant view
A short walk away was the Temple of Olympian Zeus. Honestly there is very little left of it and it's skippable (nice history, but there isn't much left of it, and the unfinished restoration didn't bring it back to its original grandeur). The Roman Hadrian Gate outside is more interesting in my opinion.
Next was Archeological Museum (blog clickme). It's somewhat out of town, and sadly due to orthodox easter week, some amount of staff did not show up for work, so 1/3rd of the museum was closed, pretty vexing. That said, was was open was definitely a very good collection (read blog for details)
From there, museum street was next, and five different museums to visit:
Byzantine and Christian Museum was another half closed museum. The collection was interesting and unique, but also showed that the artist skills from those times, were not good ;)
it's an interesting fork of christianity, with its own written language
ouch
also ouch :)
The National Gallery was a cool building, various kinds of art, not essential but it was a short walk away;
National Museum of War showed some wars as seen from the Greek involvement in them. Always interesting to see history from another perspective:
The Museum of Cycladic Art was next down that long museum street, nice collection and ancient history:
Last was the Benaki Museum of Greek History and Culture, an impressive private collection:
Athens Day3 Evening: Walk Around the Parthenon
Most of Day 3 was on a day tour, but there were a few hours left over in the late afternoon to walk around. Because of orthodox Easter, it was all fun and games until we hit a procession of thousands of people, ran away the other way, and the poor taxi that tried to drive us around had to go 3 times longer around town as most of the streets back to our hotel had been blocked and it took forever to find a path back.
A walk down Anafiotika
more cats :)
checked out a few tourist stores:
AFter finishing the loop of the Parthenon, ran into an easter parade, so I knew it was time to get the hell out before everything got blocked. By then many streets were already blocked and the uber had a hell of a time to get us back (took more than twice as long):
And that was it for Athens, time for bed and an eearly 07:00 ferry to Mykonos the next morning
The Roman Agora, along with Rick Steve's audio tour, was enjoyable to visit. Even if again a lot is missing, the museum had good exhibits of what was found, and the temple of Hephaestus is actually the best preserved temple I saw in Athens.
found lots of cats all around athens, many on this site, and they were friendly
more cats :)
christian church added later
Good views from the site, of course:
parthenon doesn't look nealy as good
The museum was good:
this was actually a sensus counter for voting
The temple was in pretty good shape:
Also found that athens had wild tortoises roaming around
This was randomly part of the Psyrri walk in Athens, and a hillarious find. HAd to stop and enjoy the place for a little while. They really went all out, it was both impressive and fun:
The Parthenon is of course what Athens is known for, so I put it first on the list. It's supposed to get very busy during teh summer, but I arrived just during the shoulder season when times were moving from winter to summer hours, and when getting in at 08:00 sharp as it opened (with a timed reservation), the place was pretty nice and quiet. By the time we left, around 10:00, it was starting to be overrun with tour busses.
took the less busy south entrance, got in a few mimutes
While expectations were probably higher than they should have been, overall the place had suffered too much damage over the years and looked a bit disappointing to me. The fact that it used to house a church for a while, and was also used a munition depot and that a lucky shot during a war, ignitied and exploded all the black powder, causing a huge explosion, did not help. I was disappointd that after 40 years of renovations, it still looked like mostly pile of rubble, but was told later that there is apparently some rule that says you can only add 30% of missing materials, beyond that you're supposed to leave things alone. This is not my field, but I'd have been happy to seen it rebuilt, even if other material, to get a better feel for it. Of course the fact that the british stole half of what was left of the 2 triangle roofs and are keeping it in the british museum, did not help.
what is left of the decorations, the rest were stolen by the british
michoko bird!
The side temple, Erechtheon, looked a bit better:
One big plus of that location is that you can see all of athens from it and see many other sights:
what left of the temple of Olympian Zeus
and the rebuilt Panathenic Stadium where the 2004 olympic games were held
So maybe it was a bit bittersweet, but still very nice to see this site that was on my bucket list for sure
For the rest, please read my previous blog on chambers and how I compared them. I also list 3 1.5 ATA only chambers you can pick from and that I would reasonably trust. The price is similar enough though that the only reason I would not buy the Olive 2.0 ATA chamber is if you don't like the car seat belt straps you need to use in addition to the zippers and that are needed for extra structural integrity. You can use them as a single user without help, but they add I would say 20 to 30 seconds of work getting in and out of the chamber without help.
