The 25th annual Burning Man festival recently wrapped up in the middle of the Nevada desert, and inthemix braved the dust and heat to report on what happens at the world’s most epic festival.

Selling out for the first time in its history, Burning Man is unlike any other event in the world. It takes months of planning (flights, RVs, camping equipment, fuel, food and drinks are just the beginning), a healthy sense of adventure and a pretty open mind.

Some of the biggest DJs in the world attend Burning Man, but there’s no real set times and no real main stages. DJs at Burning Man 2011 included M.A.N.D.Y, Damian Lazarus, Infected Mushroom, Crystal Method, Lee Burridge, Desyn Masiello, Freq Nasty, D. Ramirez, Andy C, Elite Force, Meat Katie, Scumfrog, Seth Troxler and Lee Coombs, with hundreds of others scattered around dozens of makeshift theme camps and art cars at Black Rock City.

When you first arrive at Burning Man – after hours of queuing down a single-lane highway – you get out of your car and a complete stranger approaches, wraps their arms around you and says “Welcome home”. Over the next week, and in the strangest possible way, Black Rock City does become a second home.

You can watch all the videos and photos that you want, but nothing can fully prepare you for the feeling you get at Burning Man. On bikes, art cars and foot, 50,000 people from all over the world roam around the desert dressed like Mad Max extras, camping in harsh conditions to create a temporary city in the desert.

Complete with its own post office and radio station, Black Rock City has a few infamous principles that everyone agrees to abide by, like no currency, a gifting economy, radicial self reliance and expression throught art. Burning Man is whatever you want it to be: a non-stop party, a spiritual experience, a break from consuming or – for most – a combination of all of the above.

Amidst the swirling dust storms and blistering heat, each new day on the playa gives you another thousand reasons why Burning Man rightly deserves its top place as the #1 festival in our Festivals To Do Before You Die.

To give you a sense of what Burning Man is, check out the following video created by WallabyWay.com for inthemix this year.