Local resident John Cerney's ultra-realistic, oversized painted figures can almost stop traffic along Salinas and Monterey County's roads. It’s so life-like that visitors who have seen it in magazines come to shop at "Sam's Friendly Produce Stand," which is really a roadside mural so popular that local companies pay up to $1,000 each to have their names inscribed on the produces boxes. Nearby, giant-sized farm workers tower over the crops growing at their feet.

Salina's most famous son, John Steinbeck wrote some of his best-known stories and novels about the Salinas Valley, including East of Eden and Flight.