Today we had made reservation to tour the castle, not the Meacham’s Castle although it would be nice to see these good friends, we went to the Hearst Castle.
What can you say about this estate covering over 90,000 square feet, 4 buildings, 56 bedrooms, 41 fireplaces, 61 bathrooms and 19 sitting rooms. Extravagant, opulent, magnificence, and overstated I could go on and on with the adjective and this was a summer home.
Our guide Shawn was a wealth of information and had been a guide for 32 years.
The estate's magnificent main house, "Casa Grande," and three guest houses are of Mediterranean Revival style.The towers of Casa Grande were inspired by a Spanish cathedral. We even got to hear the bells go off at noon to the tune of “Greensleeves”.
Hearst and Julia Morgan, architect collaboration was destined to become one of the world's greatest showplaces. As they were planning and constructing his dream home, Hearst renamed the rocky perch "La Cuesta Encantada" - The Enchanted Hill. By 1947, Hearst and Morgan had created an estate of 165 rooms and 127 acres of gardens, terraces, pools and walkways.
I was most impressed by the pools. The outdoor pool areas.
The indoor pool
The tennis courts
We also visited a guest bedrooms, dinning room, and game room.
Tapestry’s and ceilings
Doors
Outdoor areas and views
I view from the visitors center looking up at the Castle.
I hope you enjoyed your tour of the Castle from our perspective, it was worth the cost of admission.
We left the Castle and went to visit the elephant seals. They were very interesting and I will write about that later.
1 comment:
Thanks for the tour... It certainly is beautiful. Can you imagine living there??!
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