Cone Peak, in the Santa Lucia Range within the Ventana Wilderness of Los Padres National Forest, is the range’s second highest summit and one of the most dramatic coastal mountains in the contiguous United States, rising nearly a vertical mile only 3 miles from the Pacific. Its steep slopes support a striking transition from oak woodland and chaparral to pine forest, including old-growth sugar pine and rare Santa Lucia fir. Long visited by botanists for its unusual plant life and popular with hikers, the summit is also marked by the decommissioned Cone Peak Lookout, built in 1923 and later adapted during World War II and by the U.S. Forest Service.