You're right, of course. Our rule-of-thumb, back in the day, was a half-case/day...I guess I was with the wrong group!
And the Black Rock was an excellent place for that kind of bad behavior!...out on the playa away from any others, anyway.
A couple of Fly Geyser stories. When my son was 6 we were there, I set camp near the pond, as could be done in the olden days. There was an old dredge crane abandoned there with a long boom rising up over the marshes.
I heard my son calling me, and looked around, no kid..... He calls out, "Dad look up here!" and there he was, at the top end of the boom, about 50 feet off the ground...
Another story, the Zit on the Face of the Desert, also known as Burning Man was once held in a field adjacent to Fly Geyser, the burners descended in masse to the pond and churned the crystal clear water to mud. While myself and the girlfriend of the week watched, there were various antics (no we were not part of the Burning Man, we just wandered by as I often did, in the olden days. A fellow with a hand drum was up on the travertine terrace by the geyser dancing, which included stamping his feet ( I was not close enough to him to tell him that stamping on travertine was not a good idea), well, he broke through, at least up to his knees into the boiling water beneath the terrace.
Yes, he screamed, lustily and lengthily and was scalded, second degree burns, and had to be evacuated..
And yes, my boy was there also, about 13 years old this time, and fascinated by the couple who were moving rhythmically and thought they were hidden from view.
