DOSE: T+ 0:00	14.2 mg	oral	2C-I	(liquid)
T+ 0:25		inhaled	Pharmaceuticals	(gas)

BODY WEIGHT:

60 kg

Compound: 2,5-Dimethoxy-4-iodophenethylamine hydrochloride, 2C-I HCl
Dosage: 14.2 ± 0.4 mg (based on rated accuracy of the scale and volumetric solution).
Purity: m.p. 243 - 245 °C with decomposition (PiHKAL: 246 - 247 °C).
Intention: Trying out the last compound of the halogen 2C-X trio, and possibly addressing some depressive symptoms that flared up in the last few weeks.
Age: Mid 20s.
Weight: Around 60 kg.
Set: Mood normal, dosing right after making the volumetric solution after waking up.
Setting: Starting at home, then moving out to the local park, going to a botanical garden, then back home and lying there on the bed in the untidy mess of my room.
Background: Somewhere in the range of 20+ psychedelics, mostly phenethylamines.

Trip report

This is a rather long report of a casual, regular trip. I do enjoy from time to time to make long-format trip reports. I know there is a case to be made for such experiences to be private, but personally I enjoy reading lengthy trip reports of other people with an unnecessary level of detail. So it is only fair to give back the same to people who are similar to me. If you would just like a quick conclusion, jump to the end.

Usually, I make time stamps when writing trip reports. However, this time, I did not record many, so I'm going mostly from memory and will not bother too much with the actual timeline. I was pretty excited to try the last of the active halogen 2C-x compounds after 2C-B and 2C-C. Because I read some trip reports that suggested 2C-I has a certain potential to go deeper than anticipated, I was a bit apprehensive of which dose to try. However most reports did imply it was more likely to be manageable than not. I did not want to start with a completely low dosage, rather something comparable to about 18 mg 2C-B orally, give or take a few milligrams. I eventually settled on 14 mg, which turned out to be 14.2 ± 0.4 mg due to weighing out too much. I made the volumetric solution right after waking up after about 6 h of sleep, and dosed around 8 AM.

The compound was dissolved in 1,2-propanediol for volumetric dosing, then diluted further in about 100 mL tap water. Most of the taste was masked by the unpleasant somewhat sweet taste of the PG, yet I shuddered some. I made the volumetric solution still in my pyjamas, so I decided to shower before heading out, intending to leave the apartment before the actual effects started. At about 25 min, I was already a bit inebriated, i.e. I had trouble concentrating on the task at hand, searching the keys, thoughts being a bit spacy, that kind of stuff. I also didn't know what to put on, because most of my neutral T-shirts were in the laundry. Neither the T-shirt detailing a 5-MeO-DMT synthesis nor the tie-dye seemed appropriate for being entirely unsuspicious (I settled on the tie-dye), and the psychedelic fanny pack and Lennon-like hair probably did not help with the overall look either. There was a bit of shortness of breath (which is brought on by many phenethylamines for me), so I inhaled 200/6 µg beclometasondipropionate/formoterolfumarate dihydrate (my prescribed medication for asthma), as well as ingested a tablet of 10 mg cetirizin dihydrochloride, anticipating hay fever. Both of these medications I had previously combined with various phenethylamines with no perceived side effects, but I am not a doctor or pharmacologist.

At 35 min, I was heading to the local park. There was a bit of anxiety of being in public now (typical for me on psychedelics), and I damned myself for wearing a bright tie-dye when the weather would have certainly allowed for putting a more neutral hoodie over it. But who is going to know anyways. I also felt a bit of nausea.

About 45 min in, I started to yawn, which is a typical alert for me on psychedelic phenethylamines. There was some visual activity already, mostly some patterns forming from the light of the sun shining through leaves of trees, but no discernible geometry in it. The lush green in the park was mesmerising. The underlying public anxiety reminded me of a thought I wanted to explore on psychedelics. A couple of weeks ago I had gotten in a discussion with my girlfriend who was rightfully of the opinion that I caged myself in by caring too much about what others, even strangers would think about me. One of the points, but certainly not limited to appearance, was my rather normal and boring style. I knew this to be true because I once experimented with painting my finger nails and felt pretty anxious being in public transport, even hiding my hands - despite actually liking the colour. Immediately an insight came - I just want to avoid standing out too much, blending in, because of wanting to hide my interest in drugs and their chemistry. It made perfect sense to me. But upon later reflection, this insight turned out to be far fetched, or at least only partially true. I always wanted to blend in, to hide, not make a scene. And if I really wanted to be undercover, I wouldn't be walking around on a far analogue of mescaline while wearing the attire of a person who broke out of the containment of a goa festival.

An hour into the experience, I realised I would have to go visit a toilet to pee. The only free option would be the toilet in the nearby botanical garden, but I wasn't sure if it was open already. Opening the website, I saw something about an event for today, the 16th June. I went "wait a minute, today is not the 16th", and sure enough, after checking the date, I realised it is the 17 June of 2025, Alexander "Sasha" Theodore Shulgin's birthday. An electrifying zap made it diagonally through my body, and my mood which was neutral before got good, albeit certainly not euphoric. I promptly forgot about checking the opening hours and instead thought about Shulgin, feeling a gratitude for his work that made my life a little more colourful. Although I am an atheist, I wondered if he would smile upon me now from heaven. I also felt a little bit of envy for all the great and interesting people meeting and celebrating at the Farm, knowing fully well I'd likely never be able to come out of the closet with my passion and do above-ground legal work. I did feel a bit ashamed for forgetting about Shulgin's birthday despite knowing it beforehand, but at the same time it felt quite appropriate and meaningful that I naturally gravitated to a trip precisely on that day. At some point, I noted I had completely forgot about looking up the opening times and found out the garden was open, with me heading towards it. I also noted some cramping in the stomach and hoped going to the toilet would bring some relieve.

Making my way through the local park, the appearance of the grasses reminded me a bit of how they looked on 2C-E, although not exactly the same. It is hard to put in words, but it was about the lighting, tone of colour and the pale yellow of the grasses being surrounded by a glowing aura. Across the field I could see a big tree and together with the music it made for an awe-inspiring moment. I felt connected with that tree, nature as a whole. I felt inspired to take 2C-I out to a hike, being completely out in nature and surrounded by magnificent rocks would certainly be even more impressive than it already was here in the city. But I wasn't sure if 14 mg would be the right dose for it, perhaps too much for technical terrain - maybe 12 mg? On the other hand, while I was certainly at a solid dose, it did feel still manageable to be safe if I stayed on more secure paths. As I approached the garden, a small wave of nausea overcame me and I had to walk a bit gentler not to risk puking. The stomach was still cramping, not terribly, but certainly distracting.

Arriving at the botanical garden, I did not spend much time looking at the plants, instead heading straight for the toilet. As is typical, the trip turned up a notch while sitting on the bowl. There is just something about bathrooms. The tiles had a gradient on it, being animated by the psychedelic to a fierce fire. I could not help but associate it with hell, which caused me seeing a screaming face within the fire. I did not really feel afraid, but discouraged the 2C-I from going into an uncomfortable direction, and it complied. No faces, and the intensity of the fire got reduced. After finishing, I took a short moment to look at myself in the mirror. I looked a bit unkept, the blue under-eye circles pronounced in colour and it was if my face was a bit more colourful in general. I did not dwell long enough for mesoamerican patterns to emerge on my face, but I'm sure they would have arrived and been similar to previous experiences with mescaline, isoproscaline and later, after first brought on by the scaline experiences, to 2C-B. I considered walking through the botanical garden, but despite not many people being there, I felt a bit watched. As if anybody cared if I looked at a flower or insect too long and could deduce I was on a psychedelic. I looked at my phone for the time, briefly seeing a silhouette of a woman's face on an album cover of a song that was being played. This association with femineity brought on an otherwise unusual drug-induced hornyness. I did not fantasise about anything, it was just a general feeling of being frisky. This was a bit uncomfortable as it mixed with the elderly smell of a group of old people entering the garden as I was exiting it and I quickly got over it.

I made it back into the park, heading homewards. I did enjoy the scenery and would have liked to lay down flat in the grass - but did not want to seem weird and drugged either. I admire people who just don't give a fuck. Some thoughts were spent on whether or not I would feel completely at peace with being somewhat visibly on psychedelics in the public if they were legal. Probably not, there is something about being vulnerable. It would certainly be nice to have a property with a garden, being able to be outside or inside while not being in the eye of the public. Is it even appropriate to be tripping in public? I think there was a line in PiHKAL by Ann that cautioned about psychedelia spilling over onto unsuspecting people, or something to that degree. I was also a bit sad about mostly solo tripping. I've only tripped three times with other people, and a handful of times with my sober girlfriend as sitter. But countless times alone. Maybe it would be nice to share the material with some chemist friends I tripped with once on 2C-B. But it would be a new material to them and I'm anxious of suggesting a dose to anyone. Also 2C-B is so much rounder, without the edges and bodyload I felt now with 2C-I. I came across a couple of beautiful crows and they seemed to recognise me from sometimes feeding them. They certainly did not flee. Sadly I had no nuts on me. Beautiful and intelligent creatures. My hands felt a bit weird, reminding me of my experience with 25E-NBOH which had caused a panic attack triggered by my fingers feeling like they were numbing. I had to relearn tripping afterwards, being often reminded and retraumatised of my numbing fingers during further trips. I realised my hand was feeling weird because of the hard bouldering session of the day before, and probably with the 25E-NBOH there was a similar case to be made from my hands being exhausted from a repetitive movement at work. The latter was not a new insight, but this experience with 2C-I now gave further evidence. Despite only being outside for at most 2 h, I wanted to go home now. I felt a bit tired, yawning frequently, closing my eyes while walking, causing weak neon-outlined afterimages of whatever I was seeing before with open eyes. I did not feel particularly stimulated. I was also hungry, having not eaten anything. I felt bad because I am a bit underweight, while also training to gain some muscle. I should eat more consistently and healthy.

Exiting the park, the loud noises of the cars were a bit disorientating, and I dutifully waited at each crossing for green light even with no cars in sight. On my way home, an old woman stopped next to me on her bike, seemingly wanting to ask for the way. I did not react fast enough and instead walked past her, my headphones still in, ignoring her, pretending I did not realize she wanted to ask me something. I did feel a little bad about it, but I certainly felt too high to be holding a conversation without seeming off. I don't know much beyond the few places I frequently visit, and now on this dose giving navigational advice that went further than "is straightforward not a good direction to head towards to?" seemed straight up impossible. I was reminded of the one trip with aforementioned friends. The question of some old ladies with e-bikes making it through a shrubbery path if it would get better soon was answered by the excited barefoot-centric exclamation that soon there would also be sand, earning us an annoyed look. Making it back to the centre of the city, the noises grew louder to the point of being nauseating.

Across the street, I saw a group of older soldiers, probably generals, waiting in front of a hotel. I was a bit afraid of having to walk by such an authoritative group in my state. I used to be a pacifist, but my views have changed since Russia's attack on Ukraine, war in Europe, the unthinkable. Despite knowing about some of the questionable tendencies in the army of my country, I felt grateful that there were people protecting the freedom of my nation. I came to the conclusion about being a coward, rather wanting to be protected than protecting. It made me feel feminine. I would not want to sit in a trench, waiting for a bullet to hit me, just for some stupid quarrels of some assholes who can't get their mouth full. Arriving at my apartment building, I had to awkwardly get my in-ears out to greet the janitor, who was talking to a police officer checking up on some bicycle. No illegal compounds to be found in my home, I swear! I do look totally sober, right? I was quite happy to be alone in the elevator, as the confines made the visuals intense and I wouldn't have liked some awkward conversation.

Back in my apartment, I had to go to the toilet again. My olfactory senses were enhanced and I noted the smell of my (open) cannabis grow tent much more than usually (pretty much odour-blind to it by now). There was also some weird smell, and I was worried of the plant being infected by some disease again. Or I may just not know how weed is supposed to smell, it is hard to tell at this point. With my last plant, I noted the same smell, yet found no evidence of fungal or bacterial growth even under the microscope. While I typically enjoy looking at cannabis when sober, now I met both the smell and look of the plant with some disdain. The plant felt alien, weird, not really worthwhile in comparison to psychedelics. Again, sitting on the bowel, the trip got a lot more intense with much movement from the bathroom tiles. I forgot to look at myself in the mirror.

I was able to ignore all the mess in my room, instead just laid on the bed. There was still a bit of nausea coming and going, the constant mild stomach cramping and now also muscular tension, which resulted in me doing some stretching to no avail. I also began to get involuntary shakes in my leg. I do get them sometimes with 2C-B, or other psychedelics, and typically I'm able to reframe them as shaking off all my sorrows. Now, it was just a bit annoying, with no narrative. Staring at the ceiling, I was surprised by the amount of visual activity, especially for dosing right at the start of the PiHKAL dose range. There were moving patterns on the ceiling, somewhat resembling turning cogwheels, but embedded within static noise, rather than clear outlines of the cogwheels I sometimes got during other experiences (I call them "machinery of the universe", and usually when I see them things are intense). Colours were wish-washing in my bookshelf, this being similar to either 2C-C or 2C-B, but a bit different in nature. Probably a bit faster and edgier than either of the two. I also had some nystagmus, causing a blurry image, enhanced by the tracer effect which was also visible when waving my hand before my eyes, albeit less pronounced than with 2C-E. I was able to doze off/daydream in bed with semi-closed eyes in a manner similar to 2C-B. While the body itself felt like if it was a bit caffeinated and the heart running a bit fast (although I did not check my pulse), mentally, I did not feel stimulated at all. So much for 2C-I being very stimulating. I had secretly hoped for some of the weird tweakyness of isoproscaline, which was certainly an interesting twist to the psychedelic experience.

Lying in bed, some of the hornyness returned. Again, it was not really attached to any visualisation, it just came as a feeling. I laid on my back, staring at the ceiling, wondering how sex would feel. Certainly the stomach cramping would be somewhat distracting, unfortunately. But I could very well imagine being touched, and while I did not test it myself, I would expect an enhancement of tactile sensory input. It would certainly be quite interesting being passive while watching the ceiling doing psychedelic ceiling things. Though being passive would be a bit unfair, my girlfriend currently has a low libido and I would be ashamed of asking her to get me off while being drugged. Thinking about my girlfriend also made me excited about the prospect of potentially moving together quite soon, and I was unsure how to manage to hide all my books about psychedelics, cannabis growing equipment, petri dishes and a sizeable and seizable collection of psychedelics and paraphernalia to my parents which would surely help in the moving process.

Unfortunately I got distracted a bit by my phone and stopped the music to watch some video. I did not turn it back on, instead reading about Zn/HCl reductions, potential copper-based aluminium amalgam replacements, unnecessarily fading out the trip. It felt by 4h15m, most of the useful window of the trip was over. Now I was just waiting for the residual weirdness to leave, and man, did it take a long time. Typically, I find myself at the shorter timeframe given in PiHKAL, so I kind of expected for the whole trip to be over by 6 h. Instead even at 8 h there were still some residual feelings, but I quickly got over them when I went outside to head to my girlfriend. This was a bit of a let-down, as I hoped for a longer "working window" than with 2C-B, but it was only a little bit longer, while the coming down completely process was much longer. If I had done it in the evening, I would have probably vaped some cannabis and headed to bed at 6 h into the trip. I'm sure I would have had a bit of a hard time getting to sleep, but not much more than with 2C-B. A headache developed towards the end of the experience and stayed around for the evening, but did not extend into the next day.


Conclusion:

Although it is hard to tell if it was only intellectualised, it certainly felt like one can group together the three halogen 2C-x somewhat and separate them from the rest of the phenethylamines I tried. Overall, I felt like 2C-B would probably be the most well-rounded and balanced of the halogen phenethylamines. It is certainly possible I come to this conclusion due to the description by a friend, who called 2C-I "spiky", but it did feel a bit sharper around the edges than 2C-B. There was less of the entactogenic warmth, but it did not feel impossible to reach those states either, and it's not like 2C-B is consistently warm. It was certainly a hell lot more visual. The intensity was about equal to 16 - 18 mg 2C-B HCl oral, but at this dosage I hardly have visuals with it while 2C-I at 14 mg rivalled some of my most visual trips with 2C-B! Unfortunately, the bodyload was distracting from the experience. I don't need every phenethylamine to be entactogenic, but the 2C-I, while probably more introspective or a bit deeper than 2C-B, was not quite interesting enough for me getting past the bodyload. 2C-E does, and it is torturous to me! If I had to describe the halogen 2C-x on a spectrum, I'd say that 2C-I is probably as far removed from 2C-B as 2C-C, but in different directions. While 2C-B is proper swimming, 2C-C is at most ankle-deep, a bit bland honestly. On the other hand 2C-I felt like it could have quite some depth, feeling like swimming out to the ocean. I do want to emphasise that all of them are individual, and there may be some bias in just putting all 4-halogens, or all 4-alkyls, etc., together. But 2C-B certainly was the most comparable compound of those I tried. If it wasn't for the bodyload, I'd be eager to explore 2C-I again soon. But for now, I find it more interesting to ramp up the dosage from my handshake dose of the very promising 2C-T-2 a bit further, or to explore active levels of DOT. Or something else entirely.

Exp Year: 2025	ExpID: 119018
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 20
Published: Nov 15, 2025	Views: Not Supported
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2C-I (172) : First Times (2), Nature / Outdoors (23), Various (28)