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Comment by ravenstine | Hacker News Reader

I had the opposite experience. I'm normally the kind of person who likes visiting unusual places, but I found nothing appealing about the Salton Sea. The smell was horrendous, there were flies and bees everywhere, and the rural decay wasn't really as impressive as in those artsy HDR photos. It's a horrible place that I vowed never to return to.

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That’s what makes it so appealing to me. It was one of the most depressing places I’ve visited. Slab City is even worse. It blew away my expectations. I thought the documentaries and coverage of it were overblown, but no, that place is more fucked up than I ever imagined.

I think it depends on the time of year. For example, when I drove to Alaska in the spring, I found the wilderness beautiful, but the locals told me if I had come in the summer I would have been assaulted by swarms of giant mosquitos.

Sounds like the locals really liked you. :)

I don't think they were lying because I saw joke signs declaring the giant mosquito as the Alaska state bird

Not just mosquitoes, black flies and horse flies too. I hate fly bites personally. They hurt and they bleed sometimes and flies will pursue you relentlessly. Even if you go into water, they'll just sit and wait for you to resurface.

> there were flies and bees everywhere

That's a good thing

We sat down at a table to eat breakfast there during our road trip and within 10 minutes we were swarmed with a horde of disgusting flies. The entire shore was littered with bones from dead fish. The area looks quite ok from the confines of an air conditioned vehicle.

"Disgusting flies"? That's pretty specieist...

You're just passing through where they LIVE

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