#slab city

[chillyfeetsteak]

I first became fascinated with it a few years ago when I noticed it out an airplane window on a flight from Texas to Southern California. In an expanse of endless desert, suddenly, a vast body of water. When I got home, I immediately looked it up on a map. The Salton Sea.

It’s the largest landlocked body of water in California. It sits right on top of the San Andreas Fault at over 200 feet below sea level. It is more than twice as salty as the Pacific Ocean. It is completely toxic. And I had never heard of it before then.

(photo essay under the cut)

In the early 1900s the Colorado River was diverted through a series of irrigation canals in order to provide water for the farmlands of Imperial Valley. One of the head-gates broke during a flood, and the desert basin filled with water for 2 years before it was fixed. The unexpected lake soon became a popular vacation destination; it was stocked with fish, and resorts and hotels popped up along its shores. It became known as a great place for sport fishing, waterskiing, and yacht parties. Big name celebrities visited. At one point, it had more annual visitors than Yosemite.

Salton Sea has no outlet, and is only filled via agricultural runoff. As the water evaporated in the hot desert sun, the lake became more and more saline. Chemicals began to build up from the run off causing toxic algae blooms, and mass die-offs of fish and birds started in the 80s. By the 90s, the beaches were littered with fish gills and bird bones and the resorts were abandoned. The lake began to dry up as irrigation run-off was diverted away. The exposed lake bed is also toxic, and the high desert winds kick up the dust, making the air poisonous. 

Despite the unpleasant odor, the noxious air and the summer temperatures regularly reaching 120°, a renaissance of sorts began in the early 2010s. Artist and nomad colonies began to spring up around Salton Sea. Bombay Beach, once a popular resort destination, is now mostly a ghost town, but the folks who remain have turned the ruins on the shores into an outdoor art installation gallery where the found-art sculptures are cyclically destroyed by the elements and then replaced with new ones. Many of the houses and RVs in town are themselves art pieces.

In nearby Slab City, a settlement of off-the-grid lifestylers, you can find even more folk art. Salvation Mountain is a manmade hill painted with bright colors and bible verses and maintained by a community of volunteers. East Jesus is a sculpture garden and art installation. 

This past weekend my partner and I finally made the pilgrimage to the Sea. California has the benefit of being home to a huge array of biomes. In just a couple of hours you can travel from snowy mountain peaks to lush oases to endless sand dunes. Driving the hour or so south from Palm Springs towards Salton Sea is like driving towards the end of the world.

Bombay Beach especially enamored me. The beach is crusted with salt and millions of tiny shells and bones. It smells awful, like sewage and chemicals and low-tide and rotting fish. You drive out onto the beach and park anywhere amongst the sculptures and deteriorating resort ruins. The art feels raw in a way I haven’t experienced before. It reminds me of seeing paleolithic cave art. Humans made this, with no motivation other than to create something intriguing or beautiful or sad. Not much can live out here, but what you find fills me with a great adoration for humanity. Despite the asphyxiation of the natural world, the human spirit persists.

#im sure most people know about this place but i didnt so!! #i hated writing essays in school but now in my 30s i do it for fun apparently #photos are all mine except the first one #salton sea #bombay beach #slab city #salvation mountain

[cpleblow]

The Divine

©cpleblow (2014)

Shot at Salvation Mountain, near Slab City and Niland, Salton Sea

#travel #salton sea #salvation mountain #slab city #Southern California #curious cat #Niland #religious shrine #cpleblow.tumblr.com

[colonellickburger]

Adam Docker. Scotto, Slab City, East Jesus, California, US

#Adam Docker #Slab City #California #dog

[thedesertjourneys]

Outside an art studio in Slab City, CA.

#slab city california #slab city #slabcity #desert #california #the desert #travel #photography

[hometoursandotherstuff]

The makeshift town of Slab City in the brutal Sonoran Desert might not be glamorous, but over 1,000 nomads call it home and live off-the-grid. 

Slab City, aka The Slabs, was born when the U.S. Marines abandoned Fort Dunlap, near the town of Niland. They dismantled the buildings but left the concrete slabs. Though California officially has control over the land, it’s too remote and inhospitable for it to care.

When employees from a chemical company near Niland found the slabs, they decided it was the perfect spot to make a temporary settlement close to their job.  The small trailers they brought were the beginning of the new community of Slab City.

Over the next few decades, people were drawn to the improvised city, too. To this day, the residents remain a motley collection of those with little income and people looking for a way to live off the grid.

In this forgotten place, there are no property taxes or utility bills, which makes it ideal for people trying to stretch their pensions or Social Security.

Slab City's population swells to over 4,000 during the winter months as people come down as far away as Canada to take advantage of the warmer weather and cheap living.

I’m impressed- they have a library.

When the summer heat rises to 120 degrees, most return home, leaving a smaller permanent population of about 150.

Becoming a resident of Slab City is an informal process. You simply show up, find a spot that no one else has claimed, and set up a trailer, shack, yurt, or truck.

The nearest public amenities – including drinkable water – are in Niland, a few miles away. Residents share a single communal shower fed by a nearby hot spring.

If you want electricity, you have to set up a collection of solar panels, generators, and batteries. Or you can hire "Solar Mike," who sells and installs solar panels out of his trailer

The community center, known as The Range, occasionally screens movie and TV. There's also an internet café that basically amounts to a tent with a wireless router inside. Some people are bored and some embrace the simple life.

Though police from Niland occasionally patrol the area and will respond to emergency calls, the community largely polices itself.

While drug use is common, residents say that it's usually confined to certain, well-known areas of the camp. The most common type of crime is theft but the community will shun people who are suspect. 

The entrance to East Jesus, an art installation, in Slab City.

Oddly, the remote community didn’t escape COVID and it was a hard sell for the state to try to vaccinate them.

https://allthatsinteresting.com/slab-city#24

#slab city #living off the grid #off the grid community

[welcometojane]

being nowhere 2023

#mine #cerro gordo #ghost town #abandoned #mojave #slab city #desert

[williammarksommer]

Salvation Mountain

California

All The Time In The World

Hasselblad 500c/m

Kodak Ektar 100iso

#Salvation Mountain #All The Time In The World #California #art #painting #Leonard Knight #salton sea #slab city #travel #road trip #on the road #road #road sign #sign #photo #photography #photographers on tumblr #color film #photographers directory #original photographers #photographerslife #film #film photography #film is not dead #god is love #outsider art #kodak #Hasselblad #hasselblad 500c/m

[jtmportland]

#east jesus #slab city #california

[nofunannoyingandpretentious-blog]

#salton sea #bombay beach #slabs #slab city

[corvidist]

Salvation Mountain - 2019 & 2020

#photography #california #desert #salvation mountain #salton sea #art #religious #christianity #post apocalyptic #slab city #southwest

[nsdclassic]

Jeep Wagoneer

#jeep #wagoneer #slab city

[transparentgentlemenmarker]

Slab City California

#slab city #california #californie #usa

[deathxbed]

Tour log day 5:

Playing LA tonight! a spot called the offbeat bar, I think highland park but check me on that.

Last night was a Wednesday in San Diego. Pretty dead show but like. Expected. Only annoying thing was the bar charged $6 for a rolling rock. Which is an affront to the divine, but that’s YOUR eternal soul duder.

We crashed at uncle jimmys house, slept next to a really cool piano. Jimmy is an old jazz dude who was like “surf rock!? From the desert!?” Which I loved.

Gnar and I stopped in at slab city to take In salvation mountain and east Jesus. Love to every slabby they are some of my favorite people in the whole desert.

#tour23 #slab city #desert rock

[thedesertjourneys]

Check out my interview with Dharma Diana Souheaver, owner of Up In Toke Smoke Lounge in Slab City, CA.

#california #desert #up in toke #up in toke smoke lounge #slab city #niland #slab city california #the desert #travel #smokelounge #slabcity

[paramud]

What was that one blog that would like have posts saying "we're a queer couple trying to start an anarchist commune in Slab City and we need people to donate like 50 bucks right now" and then they would reblog that post like every ten minutes for like three days and it was always some new bullshit thing they needed money for

No particular reason I just randomly thought of that blog again and wanted to see what new reasons they were using

#slab city

[katesattic]

Me looking up Slab City while watching a Kurtis Conner video about Brent Rivera:

Is Battery City (and the zones) based on ths place?

#battery city #danger days #slab city #personal #mcr