The Wild Nomads Festival - May 2023
DJs spinning till sunrise, African chefs flown straight to California, massage healers, guided stargazing, and all kinds of African-themed activities in the Imperial Sand Dunes desert – this is the Wild Nomads Festival! My friend, Mehdi, is from Africa and wanted to bring us Americans a little taste of his home here. This was the very first festival of its kind and it was such a spectacular weekend. He even brought in camels and zebras, which was hilarious because all these people were dune buggying all around us and have been doing that for years, but they’ve never seen camels and zebras there!
Our stay included authentic nomadic tents with everyone dressed in this rocking desert garb! There was amazing music and massages out on the sand, meditations, yoga, and then we drove these fun Jeeps to a natural oasis and did a Watsu Water Ceremony! It was essentially a water blessing ritual for you to purge the things you don't need in your life and negative energy. With all the craziness going on in my life, it was definitely needed! And it was really special to be sharing this space with so many delightful people. Afterwards, we had this amazing dinner out underneath the stars from an incredible chef who brought in so many unique foods for us to enjoy in the wilderness.
The Wild Nomads Festival was definitely one of the coolest events I’ve gotten to shoot so far and I’m really excited to showcase it! They're definitely going to be hosting another one in the Fall since this one was such a fun success, so stay tuned!
