Organizers of Burning Man festival pony up for ranch in Nevada

(Reuters) – Organizers of Burning Man, an annual counter-culture festival that climaxes with the burning of a wooden effigy in the Nevada desert, has bought a ranch in the southwestern state to run year round art and self expression activities, the group said on Friday.

Funded by donations from supporters, Burning Man paid $6.5 million for Fly Ranch, a 3,800-acre (1,538-hectare) property about 20 miles north of Gerlach, Nevada, it said on its website.

The festival, which has drawn more than 60,000 participants to create a temporary city in northern Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, will remain in its current location and not move to the ranch, the organizers said.

“As a year-round site, Fly Ranch has the potential to expand Burning Man Project’s activities and existing programs, as well as amplify Burning Man’s cultural impact into the wider world beyond Black Rock City,” the group behind the festival said on the website.

Fly Ranch has a geothermal geyser releasing a continuous stream of water, as well as wetlands, spring-water pools and sagebrush, the Web post said. It is not immediately open to the public.

This year’s Burning Man festival is set to take place between Aug. 28 and Set. 5 in the Black Rock Desert.

The festival attracts artists and a large contingent of technology workers from Silicon Valley, among others.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)