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Fire lookout · San Luis Obispo County, California

Rocky Butte Lookout Site

Rocky Butte lookout, Santa Lucia Mtns, San Luis Obispo Co.: CCC-era L-701 tower, cab from Cerro Alto; removed after 1999 for a communications facility.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Removed some time after 1999 to make way for a communications facility, per the register. Some items and photos are on display at the Cal Fire South Bay Training Center.

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.

Access

Restricted access

Access is seasonal, gated or needs a permit. Check before you go. The register says the site is not open to the public and is some 7 miles from paved road.

Road to the top?
No, you have to hike
Trail
The register says the site is some 7 miles from paved road.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Enclosed towerCCC tower to USFS Plan No. L-701; original BC-301 cab replaced by a steel CL-30 cab in 1977The designs: BC-301, CL-100
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1933
Height
Unknown
Elevation
3,357 ft (1,023 m)
Agency
California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire)
Land
Unknown
Location
San Luis Obispo County, California
Coordinates
35.67526, −121.05382
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ca-rocky-butte

View from the cab

What the lookout saw from its cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

This lookout is gone. The view is reconstructed from its recorded site and a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 3.0 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1933 BuiltRegister's build field reads 1933/1977. The tower is a CCC design, USFS Plan No. L-701.Source: firetower.org
  2. No record between 1933 and 1977
  3. 1977 Replaced by a new structureThe original BC-301 cab was replaced with a steel CL-30 cab in 1977.Source: firetower.org
  4. No record between 1977 and 1999
  5. 1999 RemovedRegister: removed 'After 1999' to make way for a communications facility. The year is a lower bound, not an exact date.Source: firetower.org
  6. No record between 1999 and 2019
  7. 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered December 22, 2019.Source: firetower.org
  8. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Rocky Butte lookout stood on a ridge in the Santa Lucia Mountains of San Luis Obispo County, California, at 3,357 feet (1,023 meters).1 The register calls its tower a CCC-era design, Forest Service plan L-701, and its build field reads 1933/1977.1 The register also says the tower has been altered, with metal siding added and doors, windows and an upper room changed, and that these alterations do not conform to the original design.1

The first cab, plan BC-301, was replaced in 1977 with a steel cab, plan CL-30.1 The cab that later stood on the tower had first served a lookout on Cerro Alto.1 After the Los Padres National Forest closed that station, the state forestry agency had crews take the cab down, move it, and rebuild it on the Rocky Butte tower.1 A Forest Service page says the tower on Cerro Alto Peak was maintained until 1973.2

According to the register, the lookout came down some time after 1999 to clear the way for a communications facility.1 Some of its items and photos are shown at the Cal Fire South Bay Training Center in Baywood, California.1

The register says the site is closed to the public and sits about seven miles from a paved road.1 It also says the station overlooks Hearst Castle.1 Its notes, marked "MVT 10/91," list a 10,000-gallon concrete water tank southeast of the lookout, and a vault and microwave tower nearby.1 No source we read describes the site today beyond these older notes, so we cannot say whether those structures still stand.1

  1. Rocky Butte Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/ca/rocky-butte-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Cerro Alto Campground, Los Padres National Forest, Forest Service, https://www.fs.usda.gov/r05/lospadres/recreation/cerro-alto-campground (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Rocky Butte Lookout
Rocky Butte LookoutPhoto: Johnny Jensen, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Photo of Rocky Butte Lookout Site
Photo: Steve Maurer, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Photo of Rocky Butte Lookout Site
Photo: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Lightning stool and Fire Detection Handbook
Lightning stool and Fire Detection HandbookPhoto: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Osborne Fire-Finder
Osborne Fire-FinderPhoto: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Fire Detection Handbook
Fire Detection HandbookPhoto: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Weather Station
Weather StationPhoto: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Visitor Register
Visitor RegisterPhoto: Josh Taylor, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, register numbers, agency, dates, photos, links Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  4. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, access, visiting details, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.