Piedras Blancas State Marine Reserve and Marine Conservation Area

Piedras Blancas Light Station is located at Point Piedras Blancas, about 5.5 miles (8.9 km) west by northwest of San Simeon, California. It was added to the California Coastal National Monument in 2017.

Ragged Point is a headland on California's Central Coast. It is located at the southern end of Big Sur in northern San Luis Obispo County. The Ragged Point Inn and Resort is located in the area, which, as with much of Big Sur, features seaside cliffs, beaches, and hiking trails.

San Carpóforo Creek flows through San Carpóforo Canyon and into the Pacific Ocean in a small bay 20 miles (32 km) north of San Simeon on the Central Coast of California. The creek is generally considered to be the southern border of the Big Sur region of Central California.

Montebello was a steam oil tanker built in 1920–1921 by the Southwestern Shipbuilding Co. of San Pedro for Union Oil Company. It was designed to carry oil and petroleum products along the West Coast of the United States and Canada, as well as between the United States and Chile. In December 1941 the tanker was sunk on one of her regular trips by the Japanese submarine I-21.

SS Idaho was a 10,000-ton Texaco T2 type tanker ship, original named SS Dirigo built by the Texas Steamship Company of Bath, Maine, launched on 9 November 1918 and completed in February of 1919. In 1940 she was renamed the SS Idaho. SS Idaho was attacked by the Japanese submarine I-21 off the coast of California on 23 December 1941. Sub I-21, captain Matsumura, surfaced and used his deck guns to attack the SS Idaho 18 miles off the coast of the small town of Cambria, California, but the 10,000-ton Texaco tanker escaped with minimal damage. A few hour earlier on 23 December, the submarine I-21 torpedoed the tanker SS Montebello, in the same spot off the coast of northern California, and then proceeded to machine-gun the survivors in the water. All of Montebello's 38 crew members survived the atrocity. After the war the Idaho was scrapped in 1947.

Salmon Creek Falls is a 120-foot (36 meter) waterfall in the southern Big Sur region of Monterey County, California. The falls are located along California State Route 1 about 2.9 mi (4.7 km) northwest of Ragged Point and lies within the Monterey Ranger District of the Los Padres National Forest and Silver Peak Wilderness.

The Sebastian Store is a California Historical Landmark (#726) in San Simeon, California, United States. It is the oldest store building along the north coast of San Luis Obispo County. It was built in the 1860s at Whaling Point, one-half mile to the west of its current location where it was moved in 1878. The Sebastian family operated the store for 94 years. It was built in 1852 by Captain Joseph Clark (birthname Machado) to provide goods and services to whalers and the surrounding community. It was moved from the point to its present location by George Hearst and operated by the Thorndyke family until 1914. According to a 2016 article on the "Cambria History Exchange", the store was established in 1852 by Juan Castro (son-in-law of John Wilson) who owned a portion of Rancho Piedra Blanca. Aside from the Hearst family, other prominent customers were reported to include Thomas Edison, Calvin Coolidge, George Bernard Shaw and Winston Churchill.

San Simeon (Spanish: San Simeón, meaning "St. Simon") is an unincorporated community on the Pacific coast of San Luis Obispo County, California, United States. Its position along State Route 1 is about halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, each of those cities being roughly 230 miles (370 km) away. A key feature of the area is Hearst Castle, a hilltop mansion built for William Randolph Hearst in the early 20th century that is now a tourist attraction. The area is also home to a large northern elephant seal rookery, known as the Piedras Blancas rookery, located 7 miles (11 km) north of San Simeon on Highway 1.

William Randolph Hearst Memorial State Beach is located near the historic town of San Simeon along California State Route 1, in San Luis Obispo County, California, United States. It is named for newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst (1863–1951), whose family is closely associated with the area.

Rancho Piedra Blanca was a large, 48,806-acre (197.51 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day San Luis Obispo County, California given in 1840 by Governor Juan Alvarado to José de Jesús Pico. The name means "white rock" and refers to rocks painted white by its bird population. The grant extended south along the Pacific Coast below Big Sur from Ragged Point to Pico Creek (formerly Arroyo del Pinal), where it adjoins Rancho San Simeon. The land grant includes the original townsite and post office for San Simeon, the Hearst Ranch headquarters, and Hearst Castle.

The Silver Peak Wilderness is located in the southwestern corner of Monterey County in the Santa Lucia Mountains along the Central Coast of California. It southern boundary largely follows the Monterey County/San Luis Obispo County line. Its eastern boundary is defined by Ft. Hunter Liggett, while on the west it follows closely along Highway 1 and the Big Sur coastline. It is one of ten wilderness areas within the Los Padres National Forest and managed by the US Forest Service. The wilderness was created by the U.S. Congress as part of the Los Padres Condor Range and River Protection Act of 1992 (Public Law 102-301) which set aside approximately 14,500 acres (59 km2). The same legislation also established the Chumash, Garcia, Machesna Mountain, Matilija, and Sespe Wilderness areas. On December 19, 2002 the Big Sur Wilderness and Conservation Act of 2002 added 17,055 acres (69.02 km2) to the existing wilderness. The Wilderness is in two separate units, divided by the Willow Creek drainage and the fire roads to Alder Creek. The wilderness terrain rises steeply from near the Pacific Ocean to Silver Peak itself at 3,590 feet (1,090 m). Vegetation in the forests includes California sycamore, the big leaf maple, and red alder. Open slopes are dominated by ceanothus, manzanita, coastal live oak, and gray pine. There is also an isolated stand of coastal redwoods, the world's southernmost stand of redwoods. The wilderness also encompasses a rare grove of Sargent cypress, gray pines, and Santa Lucia fir. In the spring when the creeks fill, some of the steeper canyons feature waterfalls. Salmon Creek Falls, just off CA-1, is a very popular attraction, and the Salmon Creek Trail is a popular access point to the Wilderness. Views on clear days extend to the Big Sur coastline to the north, the Pacific Ocean to the west, and the Salinas Valley to the east. Recreation includes backpacking, horse camping, and day trips. As with all wilderness areas, motorized and mechanized vehicles (including mountain bikes) are prohibited everywhere except the forest service roads.

The Southern Redwood Botanical Area (also known as Southern Redwood Special Interest Area) is a 17 acres (6.9 ha) ecological preserve in the southern region of Big Sur in Monterey County, California, just north of the national forest's Salmon Creek trailhead. Established by the Los Padres National Forest of the United States Forest Service, it contains the southernmost naturally occurring Redwood. The trees are located in the Little Redwood Gulch watershed adjacent to the Silver Peak Wilderness. The area is just north of the Salmon Creek trailhead. In 2008, scientist J. Michael Fay published a map of the old growth redwoods based on his transect of the entire redwood range. The southernmost tree is about 15 feet (4.6 m) from Highway 1. The reserve is 7 miles (11 km) north of San Carpoforo Creek. It is unmarked and is not open to the public. The botanical area is classified as a special interest area under Title 36, Code of Federal Regulations, Section 294.1(a) due to its unique botanical resources for public and scientific purposes.