It was around 4:30 when Andrew and I pulled into the parking area around Salvation Mountain.  This was the destination, a hundred miles or so east of San Diego, and a few miles north of Mexico in the small town of Niland, California.  We had arrived. In front of me was a desert hill that a man named Leonard Knight, painted and built upon with hay bales, old tires and plaster all of which were donated.  Leonard was a man of faith who believed that god wanted him to paint this out of the way desert mountain as a testament to Christianity, faith and love.  The Southern California desert is the most desolate, harsh, sparse,sun beaten place I have ever experienced, and to see this technicolor piece of art in the midst of it is truly a bizarre sight. Things only got stranger as the day progressed.  Salvation Mountain is the unofficial gateway to an unofficial "city" called Slab City.  Slab City is located on some 600 acres on a decommissioned military base in Imperial County, California, the states poorest county.  After the base closed some of the military personnel began squatting there, and forty years later it is home to around 200 year round residents and between 1000-2000 snowbirds, tourists, eccentrics, addicts, homeless and various other types who all live there rent free.  Slab City and Salvation mountain have gained some notoriety after the areas were featured in the movie "Into the Wild."