Finding God and Going Off-Grid: Salvation Mountain and Slab City

One of my favorite films of all time is Sean Penn’s “Into The Wild,” a true story based on the Jon Krakauer novel (of the same name) about a young vagrant named Christopher McCandless. In the middle of his soul-searching journey, Christopher stopped at Salvation Mountain and Slab City, two famously eclectic landmarks in the Colorado Desert of California.

There, he met an intriguing and colorful cast of characters, from the creator of Salvation Mountain, Leonard Knight (who played himself), t...