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WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-08-30, 8:56 pm

dustybottoms
Posts: 60
Location: NYC
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I will be heading back to Amsterdam in late November with a buddy. We will be staying near central station but will have access to bicycles. We plan to eat a few truffles (it's been awhile) and I want to do my best to ensure we have an awesome time. I understand there are things that are out of your control and you just can't be prepared for EVERYTHING. However, we would like to control the environment the best we can...

When I look back at some of my best tripping experiences they usually involve...

The outdoors, nature in general (should we go to waterland?)
Taken at night.
Very few people and only people that are also tripping.
A bicycle if Im not too fucked up.

Based on those general guidelines, does anyone have any recommendations on what we could do and where we should go? Or not go for that matter? Looking forward to any tips you might have. Feel free to share a good tripping story too if you'd like.

Cheers
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-08-31, 6:32 pm

DogsAfirePower Kat XXX
Power Kat XXX
Posts: 1337
Location: Michigan, USA
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As you have noted, quieter places with fewer people are generally the place for tripping.
As such, I recommend starting out in a safe place like your hotel room. That way you can get through the initial phase (which I find a bit uncomfortable and would prefer not to have anyone watch me) in privacy. Once the magic starts working, you can reassess your desire to interact with people. The bright lights of the streets create nice colors and I have always found women to be about 10x more attractive when I have had mushrooms.

Stay close enough to home base that you can return if necessary. I have actually enjoyed being out in the crowd once I was mentally prepared for it. Leave everything but your ID and a little cash in your room. It also helps to have a business card from your hotel (and sometimes a map) so that you can get directions back to your place if/when you get lost. Stay hydrated and make sure you have extra clothing or a jacket to put on in case it decides to get rainy or the temperature takes a sudden dip

Despite the fact that crowds can be fun, I still suggest that you avoid dense groups of people where your movement is limited and also avoid avoid loud noises or music and avoid negativity in general, certain metal and rap music, for instance

Enjoy
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-01, 4:18 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
Supporting Member
Posts: 586
Location: UK
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Never mind the truffles for a moment - outdoors, in nature, at night, in late November sounds very cold and wet to me!

For general truffle & tripping info I wrote a Sclerotia FAQ on here a few years ago, back when truffles were replacing mushrooms in the smart shops. Some of it is aimed at people who have never tripped before, but if you look through the different sections you might find some useful info.

If I wanted to trip outdoors in Amsterdam I'd probably do it in one of the big parks, for instance the more secluded areas of the Vondelpark. On a cold, windy day in November, this may seem less appealing! My truffle trips in Amsterdam have been mainly solo, staying in my hotel room and listening to music. I like to trip quite hard and I wouldn't want to be out in the city.

If you're planning a trip you want to consider (mind)set, setting and dose.

Set: If you've tripped before with the same buddy, that makes a big difference. Think about how you react together when you are tripping and whether you will feel comfortable around crowds or among sober people. Age, experience, personality and how well you know each other make a lot of difference

Setting: Like I say, the weather is going to be a big factor. I wouldn't generally recommend a city center as somewhere to trip, but if you are taking a light / moderate dose you could follow DogsAfire's general advice and take a wander around the RLD area without having to cross too many roads or tram tracks. Late November can be quite nice if the weather is cold/still (rather than wet/windy) and you have a warm coat. The crowds are less heavy at this time of year (especially if you avoid the weekend) and you get the atmosphere of the dark evenings and the lights. You are also fairly close to your hotel if things feel a bit too intense. Like DogsAfire says, you could stay indoors for the onset (and maybe the peak too) and then think about going outside when the trip is calming down or at least levelling out.

A trip further away on bikes is a possibility, but then you have the problem of not having a 'base' you can get back to quickly if either the weather or the trip are making you uncomfortable. For example, a ride out into the Amsterdam Bos is something I've read as being a destination for a quiet place to trip in nature, but again this is a summer thing really. Biking around the city center on drugs just sounds 100% dangerous.

Places that would appeal to me for light trips (maybe 10g) in the daytime, a "museum dose" if you like, would be the Zoo (when it's not too busy), the "Hortus" Botanical Gardens nearby, or the Tropenmuseum (which is quite darkly lit and full of very trippy ethnic stuff). If you are OK with enjoying nature/culture and getting fascinated with things, these places could be OK, but if you want to trip hard, or like to get into a silly mood and make lots of noise...forget it. Alternatively, these kind of places are interesting to visit in the daytime before you trip, as the sights and impressions then filter into the imagery and themes of your trip.

I would really stress that if you intend to trip fairly hard, or sample the stronger types of magic truffles, you want to be somewhere comfortable, safe and free from distraction, not out and about in public.

Dose: This can be a bit tricky. The selection of magic truffles seems to multiply with each passing year. Although the underlying species are unchanged - Tampanensis, Mexicana, Galindoi (inc. Atlantis) - there is a lot of choice. Some of this is due to the fact that sclerotia (truffles) increase in potency with age, so the older, more potent truffles are marketed seperately with different names, and sometimes claimed to be completely different or new species.

A "standard" dose is generally a 15g packet, with 10g for a lighter trip, although this will vary depending on the potency of what you are eating! In some cases 15g is enough to completely blow you away, and being outside in public when this happens is asking for trouble. Potency can be quite variable, it's easy to get caught out with trips that are too strong or too weak. Speak to the staff in the smartshops for guidance, explain what kind of trip you are looking for and what you are likely to be doing. They may have good tips and ideas of their own!

The current ranges of some of the main distributors in Amsterdam (each range listed from lower to higher potency), with a few of the smart shops that sell them, are:

McSmart: (Innerspace, Tatanka, The Headshop)
Tampanensis
Mexicana
Atlantis
Mushrocks
Dragon's Dynamite
High Hawaiians

Sirius: (Magic Mushroom Gallery, Elements of Nature, The Headshop)
Space Shuttles
Dolphins Delight
Golden Teacher
Cosmic Connectors
Purple Rain
White Diamonds
Royal Beluga
Mothers Finest

Magic Truffles: (Chills n Thrills, When Nature Calls, Magic Mushroom Gallery)
Mexicana
Tampanensis
Atlantis
Galindoii
Dragon Slayer
Dutchii

mushmagic: (there's a shop on Damstraat, where it meets OzA, that sells these)
Mexicana
Tampanensis
Pajaritos
Atlantis
Fantasia
Mokum
Pandora
Hollandia
Utopia

---

As for tripping stories, I used to post some of my Amsterdam mushroom trip reports on here (not much difference from the magic truffles, really). They are accounts of strange trips experienced in hotel rooms (thoughts, visuals, delusions) so expect plenty of weirdness but no crazy yarns of youthful misadventure on the streets of Amsterdam...

Amsterdam Hotel Tripping

I am a Canine Advisor of a Sonic Noiseboard

A Hallucinogenic Nightmare of Unbelievable Intensity

The Egyptian Room

The purple soundscraper psychedelic nightmare has arrived...

It's also worth looking on the shroomery.org website, where there is a searchable "Psychedelic Experience" forum and a "Trip Reports" sub-forum.

I posted my first couple of sclerotia experiences on there (from when I had no real clue about the dosage compared to mushrooms, and the quality/potency wasn't particularly good) -

Burn Everything! (Very strong, very weird)

An Unusual Hat (Strange ramblings from my trip journal)

_________________
"an 8-inch miniskirt allows the connoisseur the exquisite satisfaction of that shameful desire to put your hand up a girl’s skirt and touch her knickers".
Latest Trip Report - Aldebran Linkbat July 2022 - Finally back in Amsterdam
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-01, 11:39 pm

coolwhip45
Posts: 161
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Great post and FAQ Aldebran.

Last year I went to the Vondelpark to have some truffles. I was staying at a hostel so I couldn't really take them in my shared room with peace and quiet. The weather in September that day was quite dry and cool, although it rained all week, so instead of sitting at the bench and enjoying the view of the pond and such I sat under a tree in the grass.

I found it quite comfortable and felt in the presence of nature which made the experience a bit better. I was right near a musician in the park who was playing some light music with his guitar..sounded like Hansen songs though haha. But it was pleasant and I had the view of the pond and the lovely dutch girls riding past me on their bikes for another great view!

The trip itself wasn't to bad, but it was fairly weak. It was my first time trying truffles so I went with a full box of Mexicana which I think is the weakest kind. Didn't get to many visuals just the laughter and euphoric feeling. So after I thought it wasn't getting any stronger I decided to snap the trip by chugging some OJ. Got a weird niacin rush feeling after that and I was back to normal

The only thing that sucked is that I walked to the Vondelpark from the Winston. Which is a long ass walk lol.. So I was really tired and wanted to sleep from these truffles I had the longest walk of my life all the way back up Leidseplein and Leidsestraat. Should of rented a bike!

I got back took a good nap, by that time I think the whole after feeling wore off, I was awake enough to get a session in and head back for another long nap.. The whole trip for me took 4-5 hrs.

I enjoyed the Vondelpark for having a peaceful first timer trip, but in about 3 weeks from now I have my own room this time and I'm trying the strongest truffles for a real good trip! Any suggestions on the strongest type of truffles for good visuals?

Thanks and Gooduck!
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-02, 1:28 am

dustybottoms
Posts: 60
Location: NYC
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Thanks for sharing guys. Linkbat, I found your reply to be very helpful, and the link to your other page is amazing. I think it will be wise for us to start off in the hotel room and see where it goes from there!!!...however at some point I think I'd like to venture to the RLD and get a girl...maybe two!!!

I tripped in Amsterdam in March-14 (solo) and ate roughly ¾ of the mexicana's. I had a great time but at some point the wheels came off, triggered by the large crowd in damrak square, and I went back to my room. I plan to take a stronger batch this time. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would like truffles to take us to an 8 or 9. I would say the mexican's took me to a 6. Suggestions on which one's to get and from which smart shop?

The guy I am tripping with I have known for 15 yrs. We have never tripped together but have "experienced" pretty much everything else. My gut tells me he would be a good guy to take truffles with.
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-04, 3:26 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
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Posts: 586
Location: UK
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dustybottoms -

If you ate 3/4 of a pack of mexicana last time, my answer would depend on whether it was a 10g or 15g pack.

If it was a 10g pack, then maybe try 15g of Atlantis.

If it was a 15g pack (sounds more likely), then maybe consider 15g of Dragon's Dynamite. I've eaten quite a lot of this stuff before, it's decently strong and the potency seems to be fairly consistent. I usually stick to these McSmart products, they are vacuum sealed in little bags inside the packet and the quality is good. I think a 15g dose would be good for a fairly solid trip, but one that feels comfortable rather than harsh. For a 15g trip, this stuff is about "8 or 9 out of 10" in terms of potency - strong but not crazy strong.

I think the cheapest place to get them is "The Headshop" at Kloveniersburgwal 39 where it crosses Oude Hoogstraat (i.e walk east from Dam Square on Damstraat, which changes name to Oude Hoogstraat once you've crossed the OzV and OzA canals). It sounds strangely complicated when you write it down, but it's close to the RLD and easy to find, from Nieuwmarkt it's a very short distance south along the canal, cross the first street you come to and it's right there in front of you on the left. They were €17.50 a pack last time I was in The Headshop, most other places €20.

_________________
"an 8-inch miniskirt allows the connoisseur the exquisite satisfaction of that shameful desire to put your hand up a girl’s skirt and touch her knickers".
Latest Trip Report - Aldebran Linkbat July 2022 - Finally back in Amsterdam
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-04, 6:22 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
Supporting Member
Posts: 586
Location: UK
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coolwhip45 -

Quote:
in about 3 weeks from now I have my own room this time and I'm trying the strongest truffles for a real good trip!


Proceed with caution, then! The visuals boil down to potency and dose. Stronger = more visual.

The truffles that have the reputation for being strongest are the "Hollandia" ones, but this is just a generic name that various sellers have been using for their strongest truffles. I think this name first sprung up among online vendors, but on my August trip to Amsterdam I picked up a leaflet from a company called "mushmagic" that sells these as part of their range. This was at a smartshop where OzA crosses Oude Hoogstraat (i.e continuation of Damstraat, very close to Dam Square / RLD). I don't remember the name of the store, but it's next to Coffeeshop Extase.

I plan to try a pack of these Hollandia on my next visit, but until then I can't really make any claims about the potency and I will just quote the advertising blurb:

Quote:
The correct dose for Magic Truffles depends highly on the kind of truffle, the person itself and the circumstances. The magic truffles we have in our assortment have different strengths.

We made a list of our magic truffles below on a scale of 1 to 5, from being mild to very strong:
    Mexicana 2.5
    Pajaritos 3
    Fantasia 3
    Tampanensis 3.5
    Mokum 3.5
    Atlantis 4
    Pandora 4.5
    Hollandia 5
    Utopia 5

When taking 5 grams of magic truffles the dosage is mild in general, but clearly present. With 10 grams it will become a strong experience and with a dosage of 15 grams you can call it a very heavy trip. Please keep this in mind when taking our two strongest magic truffles - Psilocybe Hollandia and Psilocybe Utopia. A full packaging of 15 grams is advised to only the most experienced psychonauts! With the hollandia and utopia the first effects can already be felt with dosages from 2-3 grams, so please take it easy with these 2 strains.


It's certainly true that truffles can be grown to reach a potency where 15g will knock you into next week, but whether commercial sellers can consistently deliver this is another matter!

For example, I've had extremely potent doses of the Sirius truffles (Royal Beluga, White Diamonds, Mother's Finest) but then I've bought the same product a couple of months later and found that the potency is a lot less. I've also bitten into their large truffles only to get a mouthful of seed (the growth substrate) and had to spit it all out!

The single most potent 15g dose I've had was off a pack of "White Diamonds" that contained a single large chunk of sclerotia, together with a smaller chip that seemed to have come off it. It looked like a gnarled old bit of wood, and was chalky white inside. Gave incredible visuals and the feeling that an alien spacecraft was sliding through the dimensions and gliding to a halt among the buildings of the city. I thought something was a bit strange when a kaleidoscopic spiral appeared on the wall and I could see images of dancing girls in my peripheral vision. The back of the hotel room was in shadow and seemed to visibly extend backwards, the scale of the room seemed to shift, as though if I looked over the edge of the bed there would be a main road in the gap between the bed and the desk. Very entertaining, colorful and fun.

The problem is that this kind of experience can be hard to repeat, even if you buy the same type again next time. The next box of White Diamonds I had, from the same producer, didn't look the same or have the same potency.

A close runner for "most potent truffle" was the Dragon's Dynamite when they very first came out. I think the first batches must have been maturing into something crazy-potent before they were shipped out to the stores. I remember closing my eyes and seeing an aerial view of a field, like something from the vietnam war, and writing in my trip journal "I'm thinking of irrigation ditches. For the bodies." It's a sense of what's coming....you can feel yourself descending into some kind of hallucinogenic nightmare, just being crushed by a sensation of heaviness, your thoughts spiralling out of control, you daren't close your eyes because the visuals are downright frightening, the whole room takes on a sinister, evil glow...and you are going gradually insane. I wrote a short report on the Shroomery website - 15g Dragon's Dynamite Sclerotia of that experience.

But again, the potency of the "Dragon's Dynamite" has varied over time and is now a bit less ferocious. If I ate a 15g pack these days I would expect a much smoother, milder trip than that first one, but it's still a solid product. You can see from the two descriptions that a seriously potent 15g dose can go either way - it can be very fun or overwhelmingly intense and nightmarish.

These days I generally value consistency over extreme potency. It's simpler to eat slightly more volume of a consistent product than it is to rely on producers to reliably deliver on their claims of extreme potency. For example, if you eat 20g versus 15g, you have increased the dose by 33% as an absolute certainty. On the other hand, if you buy a different type of truffle in the hope of it being 33% more potent, you might be disappointed...or it might turn out to be 70% more potent and you sit there in a panic-fuelled nightmare waiting for it to stop....

Like I say, I generally eat the "McSmart" truffles. Their two strongest products are the "Dragon's Dynamite" (sold in 15g and 20g packs) and the "High Hawaiians" sold in a bumper 22g pack. The Dragon's give a solid, strong trip, certainly if you eat 20g. The High Hawaiians may not be the absolute strongest truffle available gram for gram, but a 22g pack is 50% more weight than a 15g pack, so they pack quite a punch if you eat the whole pack. On my August trip I ate a pack of these High Hawaiians and it was strong enough to make me quite subdued during the onset, the kind of "why I am doing this, I feel uncomfortable" vibe. Certainly a good, strong trip.

I would be cautious about going from a box of mexicana (which as you say can feel a bit weak) to eating the absolute strongest you can get your hands on.

A comment from someone who dived into a 15g dose of Hollandia was along the lines of
Quote:
What was I thinking? I was not prepared for what I was doing.....Having taken the 15g I quickly felt the weight of the heavy come up and an hour into the trip I was completely regretting my decision. The negative thoughts raced uncontrollably as I tried and failed to calm and console myself. .... the terror continued to pound through my chest and brain for hours.


Well that sounds like fun. Or not. If it feels like that, you just have to sit in bed waiting for it to calm down, eventually it will level out and you will relax and realize that a) this is a really fucking strong trip and b) it's awesome. But it can feel awful, awful, awful until you get to that point, especially if you get into panic-attack territory. Again, if that happens, just...do nothing and wait. Things will calm down eventually.

If you don't get much of a chance to trip, and you want to experience a full-on trip rather than be too cautious, I can understand. One thing you can do is to split the dose, and eat maybe half or two-thirds to start with and the rest after 60 mins (if the onset of the trip feels a bit weak) or after 90 mins (if you are comfortable with making the trip stronger at that point). That way you are less likely to be caught out by a monster trip that appears from nowhere - 90 minutes into the experience you can tell roughly how strong it's going to be at the peak.

So...if you've not tripped much before, but you want a good strong trip, I'd probably recommend a 20g box of Dragon's Dynamite, eat roughly 2/3 of it to start with and see how it goes. Hopefully you can relax into the trip, and then perhaps give it a little boost by eating the rest after 90 min or so (don't wait more than 2 hours before redosing, otherwise there is a tolerance effect and you won't get the full effect).

Alternatively you could take a punt on the "Hollandia" or "Utopia", or go for a jumbo 22g box of the "High Hawaiians". But these could end up well inside "head in hands, why did I do this, I am going insane" moments of regret if you eat the whole lot. I've done that plenty of times, chasing high doses to get more interesting visuals, and then I end up being so horror-stricken that I can barely look. It looks....wrong. Make no mistake, on the higher doses the drugs are eating you, not the other way around.

As for tripping in hotels, I find this is OK as I don't get disturbed, and the environment is uncluttered and neutral. I like to trip on an empty stomach (maybe not completely empty, perhaps a little snack, but 4 hours since last proper meal). I buy some snacks to eat after the trip (for when I feel hungry at 2am) and get a couple of water bottles filled (I don't want to be pissing about with tiny hotel cups when I am tripping hard and want a drink of water). My two golden rules for strong trips are "stay quiet" and "don't go outside".

I like tripping with music (the muffled background noise in a hotel would freak me out), so I have a pre-prepared playlist set up that will last at least 5hrs. The transition from track to track is useful to break up the tendency to drift off on some strange train of thought, and if you start to feel uncomfortable a new track can shift the mood to something more positive. I don't like trying to alter the tracks while I am tripping, it just feels futile when I am reduced to altering the music in an effort to dispel the feelings of doom! The fixed playlist is something that anchors you during a trip, whatever else happens, you will be back to normal if you just listen to the end of the playlist...

I like tripping in the evening, if the room has various bedside lights and lamps I will put these on (perhaps leaving the main light off) so that the room has areas of light and shadow, I think this makes for more interesting open-eye-visuals. Also don't forget that you will need to close your eyes to see the strongest visuals!

That was a much longer reply than I intended, hopefully I haven't put you off with my descriptions of harsh experiences, but to be honest if you want strong trips you need to put up with some discomfort. I think a 15g Dragon's Dynamite box is about as much as I would recommend to anyone who wants a reasonably strong trip without too much psychological discomfort, beyond that you are journeying into the unknown and you need a bit of perseverance to get the best from the experience - i.e it needs to be something that you feel positively drawn towards, not something you are doing thoughtlessly for a bit of casual fun.

_________________
"an 8-inch miniskirt allows the connoisseur the exquisite satisfaction of that shameful desire to put your hand up a girl’s skirt and touch her knickers".
Latest Trip Report - Aldebran Linkbat July 2022 - Finally back in Amsterdam
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-09, 9:43 am

kingconan
Posts: 221
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Truffles sound like my idea of hell, haha!
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-10, 8:54 pm

BlutoBlutarsky Admin
Posts: 1961
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Aldebran, great stuff! I have to admit I haven't read it all (insanely busy at my real job these days) but I'm thinking, if you're ever inclined and can find the time to merge this stuff with your old FAQ and update it however else you'd like, I can give you access to edit it. Just let me know... it's a few quick steps on my end (stupid phpBB doesn't make it as straightforward as I'd like to grant per-user access to things like that) and I'd love to have an updated version to sticky at the top of the Amsterdam forum again.

_________________
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Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-09-14, 5:41 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
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Posts: 586
Location: UK
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enjoyed reading that, interesting to hear about other peoples' experiences.

Quote:
For solo trips, I usually prefer to take a whole box of one of the stronger types, then lie on the couch with the lights out and a some music and see where it takes me.


Quote:
I've also done trips in groups. As a group, we take a lower dose so we can maintain the ability to communicate and not withdraw too far into our own heads.


I think both of those approaches are good ways to trip. It could get a bit intense if you had five people all tripping out very strongly in a confined space!

Quote:
I sometimes create playlists for my trips.


I like to name my playlists / trips afterwards with whatever theme the trip seemed to have, although after multiple variations I tend to stick with the same playlist now.... it's damn near perfect. I have a trip journal filled with notes from each trip, each trip has a different name so I can remember which is which... occasionally read them back to myself for amusement value, or just to be puzzled by the contents. Listening to random tracks can be downright scary, I can remember jazz tracks suddenly cropping up and filling me with inexplicable dread; it felt like I had drifted a long way away from the kind of world where that sort of music made any sense.

Quote:
it kind of spiralled out of control. For about an hour, he wouldn't speak much.


This often happens to me if I'm experimenting with higher doses (not the being sick bit, but the trip that spirals out of control and leaves me sat in bed feeling "not OK"). This is why I'm a bit cautious with recommending the stronger types of truffles to people. The problem is that if you follow sensible advice and have one or two low-dose trips that feel giggly and fun, maybe a bit weak, it's easy to start thinking "I'll take twice as much next time! It will be awesome!" and you end up being the guy with his head in his hands, just trying to cope with the intensity and the insanity. Like you say, I don't want to make the whole experience sound scary, just to make people realize that you have to pay attention to set and setting, and be a bit cautious about increasing the strength of the trip. If you have to sit down and "ride it out" for a while, that's OK, it's just part of tripping.

I did like the story about the coffee project; the feeling of being endlessly distracted while trying to do something, the mind-blowing complexity of simple tasks, the general sense of amusement. This is one thing I really enjoy about tripping - it's essential silliness mixed in with that other-worldly sense of something strange going on...

_________________
"an 8-inch miniskirt allows the connoisseur the exquisite satisfaction of that shameful desire to put your hand up a girl’s skirt and touch her knickers".
Latest Trip Report - Aldebran Linkbat July 2022 - Finally back in Amsterdam
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-10-10, 11:02 pm

dustybottoms
Posts: 60
Location: NYC
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Linkbat: Based on your description of what you consider to be a "strong trip" I think we will need to stay the hell away from the Dragon's Dynamite. As you mentioned in your post, I don't think it would be wise in a two man operation to get too withdrawn and fall into deep thought.

Maybe I overstated our (my) intent and saying an 8-9 out of 10 on the trip scale was a little too aggressive. Im looking for a good time with lots of laughing and amazing visuals. And triply conversations like space/time, the meaning of life, etc.

I won't throw a number or range at my made up trip scale, but based on the above which truffles would you recommend?

Also, is "The Headshop" the place very close to the RLD that has a neon sign that says "Magic Mushrooms" with an arrow pointing towards the smartshop? That's where I got the 15g Mexicana's in March.

Thanks for all the good advice and great insight.

DB
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-10-19, 11:16 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
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Posts: 586
Location: UK
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Sorry for the late reply....been busy at work for a while, then back in Amsterdam on holiday

the tracks on my current playlist are mainly "electronica" - leaning mainly towards techno & ambient, picked to create a kind of trippy, psychedelic vibe. My selections are in a little bit of a 90s timewarp but good tunes do not really date.

I have quite a few tracks from Richard H Kirk, who used to be in Cabaret Voltaire and then became a prolific solo artist. A lot of his tunes are fairly run-of-the-mill dance beats, but there are some specific tracks that work very well with psilocybin. There are a couple of tracks from an album called "The Number of Magic" - one is 'Indole Ring', the other 'Poets Saints Revolutionaries' which are very atmospheric in the build up to a trip. Another excellent techno track is "With False Identity" which really fucks with your mind if you listen to it as you are beginning to peak.

Another lesser-known artist is Rapoon, again someone with a huge number of albums that are generally ambient with some real gems among the tracks. One track I really like is "Tell Charlene" which is very atmospheric with peculiar voices and noises among the beats, and a sample of a woman saying "and, at the same time we partook of a certain kind of, ah, you might say, mysticism....". It's the kind of driving, hypnotic music which will put you into a trance. A more ambient Rapoon track is "Wadch Haj" which conjures up alien landscapes and a general feeling of awe. 'Lies and Propoganda' is another more ambient track which sounds great on the comedown.

For a real blast of techno I have a few very heavy tracks - one is 'The Glasvegas Experience' by Neil Landstrumm and another is 'The Garden of Linmiri' by Caustic Window (a.k.a Aphex Twin). These have the effect of driving the CEV into a very dark place. If you are being annihilated by aliens that have invaded your mind, this is the music for it.

For slightly more melodic techno I have several tracks off a very nice album called "Citystream" by Arctic Hospital.

For some light relief I have a couple of classic Orb tracks - 'UF Orb' and 'Little Fluffy Clouds' which are very nice, especially the abrupt transition from the driving techno of 'Krautrock' by Surgeon into Little Fluffy Clouds.

I try and get the tracks to flow properly through the playlist, starting off with ambient doodling, building up with mysterious beats, peaking with harsh techno, running through some great soaring ambient tracks and then finishing with a few quirky favourites, indie tracks and so on. I do like a few random changes of momentum - techno to Afrobeat, a random jazz tune - but generally it's all arranged to sound "right" somehow.

One of my favourite trippy tracks is 'Pearl's Girl' by Underworld. Listening to this during a trip, with eyes closed, is like flying through your mind.

As for repeating playlists, I find specific tracks can pick up associations from certain trips, but I selected the tracks to help build a specific type of mood and it works quite well. The trips themselves seem quite random in how they theme themselves, so having similar trips with the same music isn't really an issue.

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Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-10-20, 12:31 am

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
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Posts: 586
Location: UK
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dustybottoms - I think the Atlantis would be the most sensible choice (I'd recommend the McSmart truffles).

The only issue is that the potency is, as always, a bit of a crapshoot. One way around this is to split the dose. You could take an initial 10g dose and be pretty confident that you'll feel it, but it's not going to be uncomfortably strong. You should be in a fit state to wander round the RLD, say, although I'd avoid any long treks through complicated road junctions. Perhaps 90 minutes or 2 hours into the trip, you can settle down somewhere comfortable (perhaps in your room or maybe in a coffeeshop if you feel more comfortable there) and redose with an extra 5 or 10 grams (so you would be eating 15 or 20g in total).

Atlantis costs €1 per gram in the cheaper places (such as the headshop) so you could buy either 30g or 40g between the pair of you. 20g might sound a lot (I wouldn't eat it in one go), but it gives you a little more "headroom" if the trip is underwhelming and you want to redose to give it a kick. It also prevents the annoying situation where the trip starts quite promisingly but then falls off very quickly just when you are really enjoying yourself. Buying 20g with a plan to eat 15g of it is not a bad idea, you can always polish off the last 5g as the trip is tailing off (although generally you want to redose between the 1 hour and 2 hour mark to get the full effect).

I think 15 or 20g should definitely be enough for a good time and peculiar conversations. Amazing visuals can be a little harder to achieve without going amazingly mad on amazingly strong drugs. On my most recent trip I started to get some very interesting CEV, but it was so sinister that after a while I stopped looking. I remember seeing children being dragged backwards down a corridor towards some kind of writhing black fractal wall of mouths....and getting the feeling that my trip was heading the same way (That was the effect of a slightly masochistic and unwise 15g redose on top of an initial 20g). Having said that, there are some effects that regularly crop up on modest doses such as the word-soup in carpeted surfaces and fabrics, and the CEV can be very beautiful on a low dose if you take the time to close your eyes and really concentrate on what is there....scenes appear, surfaces glow, shapes move with unnerving momentum into spiralling patterns of what-the-fuck-is-that.

The little place you are thinking of in the RLD is called "Smartzone", they do seem to sell the McSmart range but I don't know what the prices are like. The Headshop is a tiny little bit further away, from Dam Square just head down Damstraat (starts near the Krasnapolsky hotel) and you will cross over 2 canals which are the familiar RLD "Oudezijds Voorburgwal" and "Oudezijds Achterburgwal". The third canal you cross is the Kloviniersburgwal, and immediately as you cross it, there is "The Headshop" on your right (cartoony picture of a mushroom above the door). Just take a look on Google Streetview, find Damstraat and walk east, you'll probably recognise the street which is full of tourists and restaurants.

**************

Finally, I mentioned somewhere above that I wanted to try the "Hollandia" truffles from mushmagic. I tried a 15g box on my recent trip but they were very weak, just enough to alter my mood but barely strong enough to sustain any visuals or actual "trip". They did come in a nice little aluminium tin though. I think I'll stick to the "McSmart" varieties in future.

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Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-10-21, 2:37 am

dustybottoms
Posts: 60
Location: NYC
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Aldebran Linkbat wrote:
- I think the Atlantis would be the most sensible choice (I'd recommend the McSmart truffles).


Atlantis it is. If all goes well during our first trip maybe we'll give the Dragon's Dynamite a chance on the second one. Assuming we trip a second time.


Aldebran Linkbat wrote:
Buying 20g with a plan to eat 15g of it is not a bad idea, you can always polish off the last 5g as the trip is tailing off (although generally you want to redose between the 1 hour and 2 hour mark to get the full effect).


I like this plan a lot but will likely take the 2nd dosage around the 1 hour mark. Start slow (maybe take a stroll through the RLD) and if/when it's time to crank it up a notch, munch down the rest of the truffles and head back to the hotel.


Aldebran Linkbat wrote:
The little place you are thinking of in the RLD is called "Smartzone", they do seem to sell the McSmart range but I don't know what the prices are like. The Headshop is a tiny little bit further away, from Dam Square just head down Damstraat (starts near the Krasnapolsky hotel) and you will cross over 2 canals which are the familiar RLD "Oudezijds Voorburgwal" and "Oudezijds Achterburgwal". The third canal you cross is the Kloviniersburgwal, and immediately as you cross it, there is "The Headshop" on your right (cartoony picture of a mushroom above the door). Just take a look on Google Streetview, find Damstraat and walk east, you'll probably recognise the street which is full of tourists and restaurants.


I'll definitely swing through The Headshop, just added it to my map. The more money I save on truffles, the more that can be better spent elsewhere (in kamers, a coffeeshop or FEBO). Do you know if The Headshop sells trip stoppers? Hopefully they won't be needed, and maybe they're complete BS, but I feel that just having them in my pocket will keep me slightly more at ease.


Fingers crossed for an epic time and journey. I'm bringing a few toys, which should help. Flashlights, candles, cool apps and possibly kaleidoscopes if I can find them. Any other good trip toys you can recommend? Maybe we never pull them out and just stare at the carpet for 4 straight hours, but it would be nice to have on hand just in case.

DB
Re: WANTED: Mushroom/Truffle Tips, Trips and Stories
Posted: 2014-10-22, 1:19 pm

Aldebran LinkbatSupporting Member
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Posts: 586
Location: UK
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Quote:
I like this plan a lot but will likely take the 2nd dosage around the 1 hour mark. Start slow (maybe take a stroll through the RLD) and if/when it's time to crank it up a notch, munch down the rest of the truffles and head back to the hotel.


Just remember that it's fairly normal to feel very few effects before ~45 minutes. If you redose at 1 hour exactly you can find the initial dose starts to kick in just as you finish chewing the re-dose, which then comes on like a freight train as though you had eaten the entire dose at the beginning. This might be awkward if you are still on the way back to the hotel. Usually I will only redose after 1 hour if nothing much seems to be happening and the trip feels unusually weak. Otherwise I find ~90 minutes gives a much clearer picture of how the trip is going to play out. If the trip is climbing remorselessly from 60 minutes till 90 minutes, it tells me I need to be careful about redosing!

There was a comment you made earlier in the thread about the "wheels coming off" your previous trip in terms of anxiety. I had an interesting little experience with a dose of hollandia (mentioned above) that turned out to be fairly weak - it wasn't much of a trip but it made me realise that you can still feel anxious and peculiar even on a threshold dose. It's the sense of being on the edge of something - not strong enough to draw you in and let you adjust, but not something you can completely ignore.

I did once try a single 15g dose of Atlantis which I took when walking around outside. (The most profound thought I had was that "This grass...looks really green." I noticed that it made me feel hyper-sensitive if people were around, for example some kids shouting and playing felt very emotionally dramatic, like I was witnessing some major drama, and I had to remind myself that the situation was, in reality, completely mundane. It was a frustrating dose because despite this kind of onset anxiety, it seemed to die-out before anything much happened (I came back inside, the trip put me in a mildly elevated mood and I decided to make pancakes, but it wasn't anything special). Thats why I suggest 10g + 10g, it should give a fairly smooth trip that lasts a bit longer than a spike from a single dose which makes you feel jittery at the beginning then disappears suddenly. I've had previous experiences where a single dose of 20g Atlantis really came on very strong and then died off quickly, so like I say you don't really know what you are getting until you eat it.

I think going back to your hotel and lounging around as the trip progresses sounds a good idea. I don't honestly know how strong the trip is likely to be but it should be fun - you should have enough to enjoy a medium-strength trip, but not enough for the whole thing to get out of control (unless you eat all 20g in one go and then discover it's at the high end of the potency range).

Quote:
Do you know if The Headshop sells trip stoppers?


I'm not sure. As the name suggests, it's more of a "Headshop" (bongs, grinders, cannabis paraphernalia & souvenirs) with a decent selection of cheap truffles as a sideline. They have a website, so you can look on there: http://www.headshop.nl

I've no real opinion on "trip-stoppers" but I have my suspicion they rely mainly on a placebo effect. Also the mere fact of concentrating on something practical (like taking the trip-stopper) might shift you out of your unpleasant mood. I doubt it will reverse a crushing, apocalyptic trip if you eat far too much!

Another place you could look is in Conscious Dreams - smartshop Kokopelli at Warmoestraat 12 (the end near Central Station). It's a nice place to look around if you haven't been in there before.

Quote:
If all goes well during our first trip maybe we'll give the Dragon's Dynamite a chance on the second one. Assuming we trip a second time.


Remember that there is a tolerance effect which lasts for several days. Recently I've been tripping on the 2nd and 4th nights of my 5-night trips, I think the 48-hour gap is the minimum you would want. It works OK providing the second trip is a stronger dose than the first (if you had a heavy trip on Monday and a light trip on Wednesday you might not feel the second one, but if you did it the other way around it would work fine). So if you ate Atlantis on the first trip, it would make sense to eat Dragon's Dynamite on the second. Based on previous experience, I think 15g of Dragon's Dynamite is decently but not unpleasantly strong; still in the realms of enjoyable rather than scary. A little bit of tolerance might blunt the trip slightly, but not too much.

Quote:
Any other good trip toys you can recommend?


It's nice to have music on, otherwise I tend to just write / stare at the walls in a trance / look at the carpet / watch my CEV. You might find that the open-eye visuals are not particularly impressive, but if you hold something like a piece of paper at arms length, try focusing your eyes directly on the paper but keep your awareness on the periphery of your vision. You might see that your brain starts to "fill in the blanks" and creates shadowy movement or objects at the edges of your vision. And don't forget to close your eyes and pay attention to the CEV; if you concentrate they become more elaborate and deep, and you can feel the trip more. I think the "trip-toys" are more useful for a general fun atmosphere and having something to do than actually enhancing the trip itself. But if you are playing with something I suppose you are less likely to sit around moodily saying "this is weird!" to each other and spooking yourselves out.

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