Route planner Route reports
Hollandia route reports, three composite trips
Three composite Hollandia trip reports as route logs: half a pack after Atlantis, a full pack with a sitter, and a re-dose that made the summit too high.
The three reports below are composites. Each is assembled from patterns that recur in published experience reports about strong truffles and in Dutch harm reduction information. None describes one real person, and no names, ages or places have been added to make them look like one. They are written as route logs, with rough times after eating, so you can set them next to the stages.
What recurs in reports about strong truffles
- The wait feels long, and the ascent then comes faster than expected.
- People who took a second portion because "nothing happened" are overrepresented among the hard trips.
- Difficult stretches usually last minutes to an hour and ease when something in the setting changes.
- The descent is longer than first-timers plan for, with waves that return.
- Tiredness and hunger at the end are almost universal; a headache the next day is common enough to expect.
Route A: half a pack, one step up from Atlantis
Composite account. 7.5 g Hollandia, chewed, in a rented apartment during a stay in the Netherlands, with one sober friend. Two earlier trips on Atlantis.
0:00. Half the pack weighed out on a kitchen scale, the other half back in the fridge. The truffles taste milder than Atlantis, more like walnuts. Time written on a sticky note on the fridge door.
0:35. Yawning and cold feet. The sofa feels like the right place. A playlist of slow instrumental music is already on.
0:55. The ascent starts suddenly. The wooden floor shows a grain that moves like water, and the light from the window has a warm, almost orange edge. Ten minutes of laughing at the sound of the fridge.
1:40 to 2:50. The summit. With eyes closed, the music turns into folding, brightly coloured shapes; with eyes open, the room is recognisable but slightly unreal. A short wave of unease ("is this going to get stronger?") passes after the friend points at the note: almost two hours in, this is the top.
3:30. Clear thinking returns, along with hunger. Fruit, then a long shower. Colours keep flaring up for another hour.
Evening. Pasta from the night before, an early night, a vivid but restful sleep. The next morning, a sense that this was clearly stronger than Atlantis at a full pack, and still manageable at half of one.
Route B: the full pack, with a sitter
Composite account. 15 g Hollandia as tea, on an empty stomach, at home with a sitter who took nothing. Experienced with half packs of Hollandia.
0:00. The truffles chopped and steeped for fifteen minutes. The sitter keeps the other things out of reach: car keys, the phone, the front door key.
0:25. A heavy stomach and some nausea, which passes after lying down with a blanket.
0:40. The ascent is steep. Within twenty minutes the ceiling is covered in slowly turning geometric patterns. Talking stops making sense, so it stops.
1:30 to 3:30. A summit where time disappears. A single album seems to last hours. There are stretches of strong emotion, old memories that come up one after another, and a long period of simply lying still under a blanket, watching. Twice the sitter asks a short question ("water?"), and gets a nod.
3:30 to 5:30. A long, wavy descent. The wish to go outside comes up; the sitter suggests the garden instead of the street, which turns out to be enough. Bread and soup at the five-hour mark.
Evening and next day. Very tired, early to bed, a dull headache late the next morning that is gone by evening. Writing notes takes an hour and fills three pages.
Route C: a re-dose that made the summit too high
Composite account. 7.5 g Hollandia on an empty stomach, plus about 5 g more after 40 minutes, in a hotel room, two people, no sober sitter.
0:00 to 0:40. Nothing but yawning, and impatience. Both decide the truffles must be weak and eat a few more grams.
1:00. Both portions arrive together. The room starts to move in a way that cannot be ignored, and the corridor noise of the hotel becomes threatening.
1:30 to 2:30. For one of them the summit turns into fear: a conviction that something is physically wrong, and an urge to leave the room. The other, also on the summit, cannot help much.
2:30. The turning point comes from small changes: curtains closed, the television off, a glass of water, slow breathing together, and saying out loud how long ago they ate. The panic eases over about half an hour.
3:00 to 6:00. A tiring, confused descent, followed by a long evening in the room.
Next day. Both agree on the same three changes for any next time: one person who stays sober, a place they can leave the corridor out of, and no second portion. The route was not too strong at 7.5 grams. It became too strong at 12.
Choosing your own route
The difference between these routes is mostly decided before the start: the height, the place and the sitter. Read before you go and the strength ladder to plan yours.
