I've seen the world after the apocalypse, and that world is Bombay Beach.
A unique wasteland borne from the notorious, ecological fuck-up know as the Salton Sea, Bombay Beach is a fascinating, sad and depressing disaster zone of a town. To give it a brief overview: think the terrain of Mad Max mixed with the people of Gummo.
Once a thriving resort town in the swinging 50s and 60s, Bombay beach is now a shell of its former self, but still holds the title of "most developed" in the legendarily broken area. What a sad title that must be.
It's a populated ghost town in every sense; broken homes, decrepit cars, and empty trailers— with the aura of lost souls lingering around every corner— abound.
It also smells like salt and rotten eggs, which is a pretty shitty combination, while decaying fish bones align the beach in a macabre pattern of doom.
A nice chunk of the town— the area closest to the beach— is straight abandoned by the few occupants of the area. Apparently, once the sea started flooding regularly, town officials just gave up and said "Lake, do your bidding" thus sacrificing 1/3 of the land area to the water gods. This area serves as the most abandoned part of town.
The drier side, boosting a population of less than 300, is a marvel in its own right. The nearest gas station is 20 miles away in Niland, so people get around via golf cart, and probably spend a lot of time indoors.
This side might be even more depressing than its watery counterpart; it consists of 2 stores, 1 bar, some trailers and a whole lot of dilapidated housing cover the landscape. Everything looks (or is) closed, abandoned and nearly empty.
I gotta say, for all that I've ripped on it, the decay of the area is pretty fascinating and unlike anything that I've experienced out here. It's a place for the curious— as lot's of adventurous LAers make the trek out to see it— and there have been loads of film docs and articles written about its depressive state of affairs.
I suggest you forgo watching any doc or movie, and go experience it yourself.
Just bring some nose plugs.
HOW THE HELL DID THIS HAPPEN?
To understand the magic and charm of Bombay Beach, one must know the story of the infamous accident known as the Salton Sea.
The Salton Sea officially graced us with her presence in 1905, when a nearby canal diverted water from the Colorado River overflowed, changed direction and ended up in a notoriously dry lakebed space in the desert. After filling it up, the newly formed lake began sucking away nearby bodies of water, eventually settling in 1906 with a unique ecosystem of plants, fish and animals,
From there, a large inland sea was born, and the government gave it the OK to be used by the agricultural industry, thus creating a crop and population boom by the 1920s.
Things really took off in the 1950s, when the Salton Sea became a tourist haven. Fishing, boating, hotels and even a yacht club force beachfront property around the sea to skyrocket in value. Business was booming without a care, despite fears that the overly salty water bed might turn it all to ruins at any point.
All seemed well for while, but generous crop irrigation would lead to the areas salty demise. Pumps were set up to irrigate crops close by, which would dissolve into the ground and carry salt and pesticides back into the lake. With no drainage, the salt would ultimately kill many of the freshwater fish, thus leading to an algae bloom and polluting the lake even further.
In 1986, California banned catching fish in the area due to high toxicity levels of the water. The 90s were even worse, with the poor quality of the sea leading to the deaths of hundreds of birds and a botulism outbreak.
Now the largest lake in California (70+ miles of coastline), the Salton Sea boosts water saltier than the pacific. With many thinking that nothing will ever be able to live in the water in a few short years, the sea’s future looks grim.
Bombay Beach is one of the casualties of the Salton Sea's demise, and serves as a broken reminder of the sordid past.
