Newsgroups: alt.drugs This individual got to try peyote a number of times around 1975-1977, sometimes dried/black/chewy, sometimes fresh/wet/gooey/green&dripping slime. One would take 3 or 4 huge juicy ones, or perhaps up 6 dried little black ones. Sometimes there was not much nausea, (after getting the totally yucky substance itself down), other times there was enough to puke once. It passed though. Actually I was more nauseous coming on to acid or mushrooms sometimes. The hardest part is eating the shit. I remember a very funny Zap Comix cartoon about gags to play on friends, and "peyote toothpaste" was one of them...... argh, the memory of the taste would produce involuntary shivers of revulsion for many years afterwards, though it's faded by now, alas :-) Impression of the trip, from so many years ago, was that it was generally not as "deep" and "complete" as acid, not totally interconnected and composed of so many lines & patterns extending out towards infinity etc, not racing thoughts physically so fast. It was very visual, perhaps less auditory than acid, perhaps lacking some of the strangest "tactile hallucinations" from strongest acid trips where one felt as if one's hand actually touched a strange thing,.... Instead, there were pastel-colors, softer patterns, more "natural" kinds of hallucinations, deep and profound thoughts but not quite on the uncontrollable express train. Indeed, it felt extremely "wise and mature" to the 18-20 year old subject at the time :-) "The Smile of the Beyond" was one impression (named after a Mahavishnu Orchestra song, or maybe the other way around? :-). It went deeper than mushrooms, though, which sometimes appeared to place hallucinations on a giant balloon-like tension surface in front of the eyeballs. Oh, yes I remember there were also lots of tinglies and chills, up and down the spine, even up and down the legs, everywhere there were nerves.... sometimes these blended with and turned into hallucinations. It took a long time to come on, sometimes up to 2 hours. Didn't last as long as big acid trips, maybe 6 hours or so. The very first peyote trip for this individual was actually also this individual's very first "bad trip" (after several pleasant acid and mushroom experiences), which was apparently necessary and instructive at the time..... one recalls waiting and waiting and waiting forever, doing too many bongs of headache weed, for it to start, then all of a sudden, a goat-like figure with nasty horns appeared in pentagrams on all the walls, nodding specifically at me, yes, YOU will freak out now, etc. etc. The tingles and chills turned into horrible scary flutters, rugs and grass and dirt would erupt with all sorts of tiny little creatures... oh yes, I remember, peyote hallucinations would often take on an animate quality of actual little individual creatures, faces with personality and history and dignity behind them, etc. ============================================================================= Newsgroups: alt.drugs When I was in southern Ecuador I tried San Pedro twice. The first time I bought some from a guy in Vilcabamba and it cost a few dollars. The stuff was pretty weak, and I made the mistake of eating afterwards so the effects were minor. There was a minor feeling of giddiness, I had this feeling like I could talk to animals in the area (pigs for example), and the walpaper in my room sort of undulated slowly. Then later I met a guy who was an American living down there and he used to make the juice from the cactus, and he gave me some of his batch. The stuff was much more powerful. I was hallucinating for almost a whole day. There was this weird feeling of comprehension--like a mole that I had remembered on someone's arm explaining why the wallpaper patterns were the way they were. It was a feeling like "It's all so trivial--everything makes sense!" In a neighboring room someone was watching TV, and every once in a while a commercial would come on that played the FLintstones theme music. This induced all sorts of early memories and feelings. Although I tried to go to sleep I wasn't able to--my mind just kept running. Sounds were sort of coming up and down, like you're slowly changing the volume of a TV. Also when I walked around my perception seemed to be a collection of still images--like there'd be a flash of my surroundings, then the next image I'd have moved a few feet. I talked to some friends that I had met and they said my sentences each alone made sense but they had no relation to each other. I can remember trying to express what I was experiencing and just drifting off and just letting it soak in. I had vivid memories of my childhood that I hadn't recalled I suppose since they happened. From time to time I would experience a memory of a friend from the states saying the phrase "can't be bothered" in a sort of English accent. It was a very interesting experience. Visually things were shimmering, rotating, morphing, changing colors, changing shapes, etc, etc. I think I sort of bracketed the optimum dose--first time I took too little and next time too much. San Pedro is this big cactus that grows all over the place in Southern Ecuador. You cut it up into pieces and boil it for like 18 hours, while frequently squeezing out the liquid in the cactus. Eventually you're left with a thin green liquid. It really is disgusting. Most people drink a bit then puke it back up. I was able to hold it down...perhaps that's why the effect lasted so long. What's really amazing is that even though the mind is experiencing things in some completely alien way, it all gets recorded so you remember the feeling. ============================================================================= Newsgroups: alt.psychoactives Yesterday I has a San Pedro cactus experience, and I'd just like to type up a quick post for those of you who are wondering about trying San Pedro. A friend of mine ordered 50 dried grams of San Pedro cactus from JLF poisonous non-consumables. He boiled it in 6 cups of water for about 3 hours, and when the liquid was brown, murky and extremely bitter-soap tasting, he stopped. He strained out the cactus solids, and divided the remaining liquid into two glasses, and cooled it in the frige untill it was drinkable. Due to the extreme bitter taste, he added orange juice to each large glass, but it did little to cover the taste. I am not exagerating when I say it tasted as if i was drinking pure liquid dish-soap. We both drank it slowly over about 30 mins, and when i wAS finished drinking that foul, basic liquid..it felt almost identical as if i had consumed 2 alcoholic drinks. This light intoxication lasted approx. 2 hours, when we both began to feel the mescalines effects come on. *There was no sickness or vomiting* For the next 10 hours, we had a rather weak, but pleasant mescaline trip. It felt like a very long time to come on, compared with LSD or psilocybin, but it was soon unmistakibly mescaline. The intensity of the experience was weak, roughly comparable to ~40ug of LSD. It faded away about 9 hours after the efects were first felt, it completely faded to baseline. If i were to to it again, and prepare the cactus myself...I would boil it for at least 6 hours, and i would would drink the solution from all 50 dried grams of cactus...i would not share it with a friend. It's intresting to try once, but not really worth the time, effort and expense compared to more potent and available psychedelics, IMHO.