DOSE: T+ 0:00	repeated	smoked	Cannabis	(plant material)
T+ 0:00	30 g	oral	Cacti - T. peruvianus	(powder / crystals)
T+ 3:00		smoked	Salvia divinorum	(extract)

BODY WEIGHT:

51 kg

It was my first time taking mescaline. In fact, it was my first time taking any strong psychadelic. Until that point I had only experience with the psychadelic effects of excessive cannabis and of weak levels of Salvia Divinorum. It was to be a learning experience.

I had been gathering drugs I was interested in for a week long party I was to be attending the following week, but as I had been dismissed from a party the night before and had just received an offer of another party from two close friends of mine, I decided to tap into the collection a little early. I rolled myself a joint before checking my collection to decide what was appropriate. I believed I was to be attending a chilled-out party in a friend of mine's father's flat. The primary drug being consumed by others would be marijuana, so the atmosphere would be friendly, and the father was a psychadelic artist, so the walls were all covered in visionary paintings. As such, I decided to selected a couple of psychadelics. Passing over the mushrooms and Hawaiian Baby Woodrose seeds I had for a later date, I found a bag of 30g ground Peruvian Torch cactus powder. I then quickly grabbed a bag of weed to combat nausea, and a bag of 20x Salvia extract for good measure; before rolling myself a second joint and beginning the long journey to my friend's town.

A 3 hour bus and train ride later (involving many situations I'd rather not repeat, such as boarding the 5:30pm to London King's Cross whilst stoned and while seat reservations were not in effect) and I arrived in my friend's town, a moderately-sized, urban decayed Scottish coastal town near Edinburgh. The train had been delayed due to flooding on the track, and when I got into town, I could see why. The weather was horrible: cold, biting wind and soaking wet rain. Typical Scottish coast. I made my way to the High Street, met my friends, bought some orange juice from the shop and headed to the flat.

Inside, there was already a handful of people, mainly teenagers younger than myself. I quickly consulted with my two friends and checked they were 100% happy trip-sitting for me if anything went wrong (having previously arranged all this, you understand), before pulling out the bag of mescaline-containing cacti. This got me some strange looks, but after an explanation, everyone seemed happy enough. I thought for a while as to how best to ingest the odious-looking powder, and even started to get somewhat anxious and nervous, before deciding to simply spoon the stuff down my gullet and then chase it with the orange juice.

The powder tasted fowl, and as the cactus was poorly ground, there were small chunks of crunchy cactus here and there in the mix, altogether making for a rather unappetising meal. It was, however, significantly easier to eat than I had expected, based on the many 'IT WAS THE WORST THING I'VE EVER TASTED!' reports I had heard. Still, I found eating it dry too difficult, and so decided simply to pour the remaining powder (I was half way down at this point) into the orange juice and drink it like that. Needless to say, the powder failed miserably to dissolve and the overall mix tasted as if I was drinking acidic sand, but nonetheless I soldiered on until the glass was empty, before refilling several times to consume the sludge lining the bottom of the glass.

At this point, I began rolling myself a joint to pre-empt what nausea I had heard I may experience, sparked up, then handed the last of my weed to the host for him to roll a joint to pass among everyone. Over the course of the next hour I just followed the conversations of the party as it moved from room to room, waiting for the mescaline to take effect. Although I noticed small effects like icy chills and slight stomach discomfort, these were fleeting things and I put them down to placebo effects.

Closing in on the second hour, and I'm beginning to feel like I've been burned. I'd expected a strong effect to begin by now, however I still just feel relatively lightly stoned. As I think I've been tricked into buying a non-mescaline cactus, I decide to make the most of the night and get stoned with everyone else. In the next hour, we have many great conversations and some good fun passing about joints, me being introduced to some new people, before approaching the third hour mark, the host has the idea of bringing out his bong.

He decides to make a bong mix, and us being low on weed, he seeks something to add to the weed/tobacco mix. Knowing I have a bag of Salvia, he requests it, and I oblige. At this point we are sitting on his floor with 3 other guys in a circle, 2 of whom have never experienced Salvia. After the briefest of descriptions of its effects, our host takes a bong hit and begins the passing. I get the last hit from this bowl, and as such it does little to me other than making me slightly more stoned. It is on the next bowl, however, where I have seconds, that things hit properly.

The hit of Salvia burns incredibly hot, like the first time I remember smoking Salvia (out of a small glass pipe using a Turbo Lighter, horrible throat-burn). The pain in my chest is suddenly incredible for a second, I cannot hold the smoke down. I cough violently, gasping for air and for a moment, pure panic and fear sets in as I feel I cannot breathe. I cough violently, lean forward, dry wretch, gasp a 'Yeah' to a worried 'Are you OK?', then lean back again, able to breathe. Suddenly, I felt the familiar pull of Salvia, amplified many times over. My mind suddenly occupied several worlds, realms or dimensions at once. I was sat on a green island that gradually broke away from the floor around me, and I flew off in a North-Westerly direction, suddenly arriving in the Mushroom Kingdom, before realising that I should return to the dimension from whence I came so as not to alienate my friends. After several attempts and intense effort, I assured them that I was alright (I have heard very interesting descriptions from them of my behaviour at this point) and returned to my tripping.

Everything suddenly became highly interesting, and I was constantly struck by a feeling of motion, as though I were flying into the walls and paintings around me. It was an incredibly strange feeling, and at times almost overwhelming. After a while in that small room with the bong circle, I gradually began to get a handle on the trip. I grew to understand that the intensity of it came in waves. At times I could almost function normally, at other times I felt completely enthralled by the visions and sensations I was having. Thinking along the lines of waves, I vaguely remembered that I was so near to the sea, and suddenly wished to go outside and view the waves, despite the weather. After some convincing, all but one member of our bong circle headed outside; them tripping on good Salvia, myself tripping hard on the mescaline now.

The short journey down to the beach was incredibly strange and unfamiliar, the cold sea wind threatening to overwhelm me at times, the rain lashing at my face providing spectacular, wonderous sensations. We reached the beach and the visions produced by the waves were excellent. I had the strangest feeling that the world as we know it was merely a huge tree, all interconnected, with the land as its trunk and the waves eminating forth from it were the shelf-like mushrooms one sees upon such large old trees. Everything felt natural, connected and altogether perfect. However it was cold outside, and my friends' respective Salvia trips had all finished, so we decided to head back inside. Along the way we walked across rocks with cracks in them, and I tried my hardest not to place my foot accidentally in one of these rifts. However, inevitably, I was not as sure-footed as I had hoped, and occasionally accidentally slipped. The shock of slipping and of unexpectedly soaking my foot was intense, and it took me several seconds to recover from it each time.

Somehow we made it back home, all of us looking the worse for wear. Still tripping, I declined the group's offer of another bong circle in favour of finding some food, as I was very hungry, and so managed to cobble together two other like-minded drunken individuals and head to the chip shop, still going strong. We eventually made it to the shop, and things were still morphing and appearing/disappearing before my eyes. As such, it was difficult to conceal my state from the staff and other customers, which made me rather nervous. This nervousness only intensified the visions and morphing, however miraculously, I think I may ultimately have managed to pass for paralyticly drunk.

Back at the flat now, time seems to be passing incredibly quickly, and periods seem to pass almost without my noticing. I set the chips down on the table and begin to dig in. They are wonderous, almost as if it is not food I am eating, but nutritious air. It passes straight through my mouth and down to my stomach instantly. This all feels incredibly satisfying, especially since the last solid food I ate was the foul-tasting cactus. We then decide to head through to the living room, and being around other people is strange. I wish to communicate to them all that I am experiencing, but I simply cannot come close to finding any kind of way to express any part of it. It is all collectively far to wonderous to gain a handle on. English fails me.

In the midst of this exasperation, my friends put on some complex anime. I sit watching it, totally enthralled, oblivious to all that is going on around me, as tracers swirl across the screen and the world outside of the television ceases to exist. I am mesmerised by it for some time, before I am sucked inside totally and become a part of the film.

I wake up still feeling off baseline. I am unsure of when I feel asleep or of whether I can remember everything or not, but it appears I can. I still feel light and floating and content, but without anything like the intensity I had felt the night before. I simply lie on the couch contented for an hour or two, unspeaking, watching a friend roll and chain-smoke cigarettes beside me. After a time, another friend of mine awakens and utters the immortal first words 'WAKE AND BAKE'. At this point, I am unsure of whether or not to partake, as I had things to return for, but by the time the spliff is rolled, I am convinced. We then proceed to spend the next hour getting stoned, but cannabis now seems to have far more of an effect on me than it did beforehand (this was an effect that persisted afterwards, too), and I am reduced to staring in open mouthed wonderment as my friends smoke cigars and blow smoke rings to the sound of psytrance and post-rock. It was truely a glorious moment.

Sadly, however, we ran out of cannabis and of time, and I had to return home. My friends came with me as far as part-way on my first bus journey, but then I was left alone to make the final 2 hours of my long journey home myself. All throughout the journey and for the evening afterwards I have a feeling of intense afterglow, which reminds me of Christmas as a child. Just the simple feeling of being completely safe, warm and protected, like everything is right in the world and I'm perfectly content. Which, for a bi-polar person who spends the majority of his life heavily depressed, is a rare occurance, and one to be treasured.

Exp Year: 2008	ExpID: 73705
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Aug 27, 2009	Views: 9,525
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Cacti - T. peruvianus (69) : Large Group (10+) (19), Combinations (3), First Times (2)