He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.

Maybe it’s the heat, lost world mirages, or the unfailing beauty of its waning skies. There’s something about deserts being unforgiving and redemptive at the same time, not least the towns along the Salton Sea. Sold as the American riviera in the 1950s but through nature’s damning sleight of hand, devolved into ghost towns and trailer parks.

Not all are of doom and neglect in the unrelenting heat. Pockets of intrigue and regeneration abound - from a quirky International Banana Museum to desert religious cults and inward migration from Palm Springs. Maybe the old apostles got it right the first time round.