DOSE:

1/3 hit

oral

LSD

(blotter / tab)

BODY WEIGHT:

125 lb

First Time Taking Acid at Bonnaroo

I took acid for the first time at Bonnaroo 2015. It was my first time going to Bonnaroo, so the group I went with did a lot of preparation beforehand. This included only bringing the drugs we would use there so we wouldn't deal with stress of driving back home with substances in our vehicles.

I had not originally planned to take acid that weekend, but on Saturday two other people in our group were talking about finding some available for purchase. I guess all the talk got me interested because I made a spur of the moment decision that I wanted to try it. As I had never done acid before, I knew I wanted a small dose. Instead of trying to buy from someone, my fiance cut off a third of his tab and gave it to me . We dosed in the line to get in the gate that day. It was about 5:00pm.

About 45 minutes later I began feeling a general sense of nervousness and very slight light headedness. I also noticed that sounds were beginning to get distorted. It was as if everything I was hearing was muffled and everything was at the same volume. I could not distinguish between sounds close to me and sounds farther away. I knew this would make conversations difficult so I chose to remain quiet. I began feeling a sense of wonder. I felt like a child experiencing life for the first time. This was a difficult feeling to reconcile with the still ongoing anxiety. In a way, they were happening at the same time but alternating which emotion was at the forefront.

Probably about 45 minutes later, visual hallucinations started to kick in. I had been camping since Wednesday of that week so there was quite a bit of dirt on my body. I looked down at my legs and saw patterns in the dirt. The predominant designs were snowflakes falling across my skin and lizards crawling around. At this point I looked at my fiance and I asked him what he was seeing. He said he wasn't seeing much of anything out of the ordinary and I asked me what I was seeing. Embarrassed that I was so much farther gone, I told him I wasn't seeing anything.

We stayed where we were for probably 15 more minutes and then it was time to move to a different stage to see My Morning Jacket. This brought the anxiety to the forefront of my mind because I felt like if I stood up and tried to walk, I would stumble. I got up and the ground began flowing. It felt as though the ground was a blanket that someone was repeatedly throwing up into the air to settle on the ground. Luckily, the crowd around us thickened as we got closer to the main stage so I had an excuse to be hanging on to my group.

Before I decided to do acid, I had often wondered what psychedelics would be like for me since I am colorblind. Well, at this point I experienced the only color alteration of my trip. This could have been due to the fact that I was wearing sunglasses and it was extremely dusty outside that day, but it suddenly felt like I was looking at the world in sepia. Everything was shades of beige. We sat down in the grass and there was old timey Mexican music playing and I had a moment where I legitimately thought I had time traveled. I thought, 'Am I at Bonnaroo? Or am I at Woodstock?' I was convinced for a moment that I had unknowingly walked through some sort of portal into the past. The only thing that pulled me out of that was seeing 'BONNAROO' written in big letters at the top of the stage.

My Morning Jacket played an 8:00-10:00pm set so it was dusk when they started playing. It felt like being in a dream. Everything was coming at me all at once. As I looked around, I felt like it was a family outdoor movie night at a school. Everyone had a group and blankets to sit on and was watching the stage. I don't think there were actual pyrotechnics but it felt like there was fire shooting from the stage with each strong beat. I remember a friend of mine (who was also on acid, but not tripping as hard as I was) looking around and saying 'there is a fucking lot going on right now.' It made me feel better to know that wasn't all in my head.

We had a picked a spot near a lemonade stand, so there were lots of random people hanging around there trying to find and meet up with their friends. It really felt like the weirdest spot to be. I thought every single person walking by was doing the strangest things. One guy who walked by us had a green, light-up umbrella and he stopped for a moment and just held it right over us. We saw a girl on the phone trying to find her friends and a random guy ran up to her, danced around her, and then ran away. By the look on her face, she had no idea who he was. Another person came and shone a flashlight on all of our feet (I think he was looking for something). I was beginning to wonder if these things were really happening or if it was all in my head when a sober person in our group said 'This spot right here is weird central!'

It was around this time that I spotted a couple in front of me who were sitting on the ground taking a selfie. They were trying to get the stage in the background, so they were facing towards me. This set the tone of my trip. I constantly felt like there was something going on just over my right shoulder. I was always looking back there feeling like something was happening that I should be seeing.

The anxiety returned when the sun had fully set and I realized it was time to take my sunglasses off. My eyes were going everywhere and for some reason I felt like people would see that and know I was high and make fun of me. Of course this didn't actually happen.

By this point, my visual hallucinations had taken off. I was still seeing the snowflakes and lizards on my legs. Clouds and trees had become symmetrical down the middle. The most exciting visual hallucinations were the tracers. At first when someone walked by, it looked like they were blowing bubbles behind them. I had a moment of, 'why is everyone blowing bubbles?' As time went on, this got more intense. It got to the point where when someone walked in front of me, their body was smeared across my vision.

Everything was relatively good up until this point. When it got dark, things got bad. I spent what felt like an hour (but was probably only about 15 minutes) very preoccupied with the fact that I needed to use the bathroom but I knew I couldn't get myself there by myself. Eventually, I asked my fiance (who was also on acid, but was not tripping nearly as hard as I was) to take me. This was the weirdest walk of my life. We were weaving through groups of people sitting on the ground and I felt like everyone was doing something weird. I saw someone sitting with her legs crossed and I remember thinking, 'How are her legs folded that way? How is she doing that?' I'm also pretty sure I saw some people having sex, but that very well could have just been in my head.

There was a line when we got to the port-o-potties. This was the first time I vocalized my discomfort. I hugged my fiance and said 'I'm ready for this to be over.' Once a bathroom opened up, I went in. I was looking down to turn the lock when I shut the door and when I looked back up, I saw a face in front of me. It took several moments for me to recognize that face as my own. There was a mirror on the back of the door. When I sat down, it felt like the walls were caving in and all of the random scribblings and drawings were moving around. I remember thinking, 'I'm never coming out of here.' When I finished and stepped out of the door, it's a good thing my fiance was standing right there waiting for me because I had no recognition of my surroundings. Had he not been there, I would've had no idea where I was.

We made our way back to where our group was and enjoyed the rest of the show. It was incredibly. My Morning Jacket played for two straight hours with no breaks even between songs. My fiance kept saying that it felt like a rock concert from a movie and he was right. It didn't feel real.

After My Morning Jacket came Mumford and Sons. We weren't dying to see them, but they were the only act on any of the stages for about 45 minutes so we planned on just staying where we were for a bit. There was 30 minutes of nothing on that stage between them. One of the guys in our group decided to go back to camp to change into warmer clothes (it got cold there at night), and bring me a sweatshirt. I still can't believe he made it back to us because by that point, the crowd had grown considerably. Unfortunately, the fact that Mumford and Sons were the only ones playing meant all 90,000 people were at that stage. When he got back, my fiance and I were lying down and he dropped the sweatshirt and a mexican blanket onto us. It felt like he had dropped actual snuggles onto us. It was incredible.

It got uncomfortably crowded. We were still lying on the ground and people were stepping on us and tripping over us. By this point, I just kept my eyes closed. I was getting extremely overwhelmed. Finally, our group decided to leave that particular stage to go to another stage to see Tycho. Some of our group had already broken off to go do other things so there were four of us. Only one was sober and thank god for her. We all grabbed hands and she lead us out of the masses.

Eventually we made it to the stage that Tycho was going to be on. We were expecting to be able to lie down and relax what with Tycho being so ambient but we were so wrong. This was the same night as Bassnectar and the Superjam. So basically Centeroo was filled with drunk 18 year olds. Again we got stepped on and tripped over. My fiance and I just lied down under the mexican blanket as both of us were feeling very uncomfortable at that time. Tycho started and it was probably the most disappointing part of the whole weekend. The bass was turned up so loud that it drowned out every other part of the music.

The three of us that were still on acid decided to get up and find a less populated area to just sit down and relax. During that walk, it felt like I was just getting assaulted by bass and lights and glow sticks everywhere. Eventually we found a spot and sat down. My fiance and I stayed there while the third person went to go find some food. As soon as he got up and walked away, I decided I wanted to go back to camp. All I wanted was to sleep off the effects. I was terrified. Everything was moving. The trees, the ground, my skin. My insides were becoming my outsides and I was melting into the ground. It felt like the entire universe was literally revolving around me. I felt like the center point amidst the chaos. The eye of the storm.

We waited for what felt like an eternity for our friend to return. When he finally did, I stood up and said 'I'm ready to go.' Thinking about going back to camp and actually going back to camp were two very different things though. Our campsite was just under a mile away. It sounds easy, but that walk was a daunting task when the ground was liquid. With tears and dirt mixed together on my cheeks, I set off.

It probably only took about ten minutes, but the walk felt like ten years. When we got there, my fiance and his friend started clearing a space so we could set up the hammocks. At one point, my fiance went to the bathroom and I don't know where our friend went, but I found myself alone. Being alone with my thoughts was the worst place for me to be. My close eyed visuals were even worse than leaving them open. I was seeing faces in front of me with mouths wide open.

Finally they both returned and we got in the hammocks. Of course, sleep would not come for many hours, but I was comforted by the feeling of lying in the hammock with my fiance, my head on his chest. Staring at any one spot for too long made everything wavy, but my close eyed visuals were worse, so I just scanned my field of view. Back and forth....back and forth....

I don't know how long it took me to fall asleep or how long I slept, but I was incredibly grateful for morning to come. I kept staring at the trees or the ground or even the side of the tent astounded that everything was still and no longer flowing. I couldn't believe that everything was normal.

What I didn't know at the time was that I had the strongest trip of the three of us. The other two barely had any visual hallucinations. All I could see were hallucinations. At first, I thought I would never take acid again. Upon further reflection, though, I think I would do it again but at a lower dose and in a familiar and controlled environment.

Exp Year: 2015	ExpID: 107072
Gender: Female
Age at time of experience: 20
Published: Dec 27, 2025	Views: Not Supported
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