The hook
A 1950s resort town that the dying Salton Sea left to rot has been colonized by artists, so its ruins now hold a car drive-in facing nothing and a swing set out in the receding water.
01Why it's worth it
Bombay Beach sits two hundred feet below sea level on the east shore of the Salton Sea, and its history is the sea's: a booming lakeside resort in the 1950s, then a slow collapse as the water turned salty and toxic and the tourists left, leaving a half-abandoned grid of trailers and wrecked buildings. Since 2011 artists have moved into that decay and made it their canvas. The Bombay Beach Biennale turned the town into an open-air gallery, and what's scattered through the ruins now is genuinely surreal: a "drive-in" of junked cars parked before a blank trailer, a swing set planted out on the cracked seabed and moved each year as the shoreline pulls back, murals and sculptures in the shells of houses. It's melancholy and funny and unlike anywhere else, a real community living in the middle of it.
02How to experience it
It's on the Salton Sea's east shore near Niland, about nine hours from the Bay. Go in the cool months; summers are punishing and the sea can smell. It's free to wander, but people still live here, so treat it as a neighborhood, not a set: don't trespass on lived-in homes and ask before photographing anyone. Pairs with Salvation Mountain, Slab City, and the Salton Sea shore nearby.