If you've never heard of Hearst Castle, that is understandable! I didn't know much about it either before visiting on a recent trip to California. But, I am very happy we did stop & I would 100% visit again, the 'castle' is breathtaking especially if you love old artwork and unique architect. Before I get into my short review of the property, let me give you a little history on this location. Hearst Castle isn't actually a castle & wasn't originally intended to be, it actually received the name after the state of California received it after the original owners passing, it was originally called La Cuesta Encantada and was simply the home and estate of William Randolph Hearst. He was a publishing tycoon whose publishing company still exists today, during his time he owned dozens of newspaper & magazine companies as well as some radio stations. This estate was built between 1919 & 1947 with help of his architect Julia Morgan. She was the first woman to study architecture & have her own practice.
The Estate is located in San Simeon, California & was built onto of a hill which over looks the ocean. Prior to building his home on the hill, William Hearst's family owned 40,000 acres of land surrounding the hill which they used as camping grounds. After he began building this estate he kept purchasing surrounding lands until he owned 250,000 acres! While the property isn't nearly as large today the property still sits on 127 acres that the state of California owns & the Hearst family still owns another 82,000 acres surrounding that which is under a land conservation agreement with the state to keep it in is natural, beautiful & undeveloped state. The property has the main house which gigantic, along with three huge guest homes, lush gardens, a gorgeous outdoor pool, a indoor roman bath, tennis courts & more. During the time William Hearst stayed here he also had his own private zoo on the property which included zebra, polar bears & more. If you ever wanted to visit the home during the time he lived here, you'd need an invite from the man himself. He invited & had guests of the highest caliber including dozens of actors & actresses of the time who would come and stay in his guest homes. If you look at the image below, you'll see a huge house & it is one of the first buildings you'll see upon pulling up for the start of the tour. This large house, isn't the main house it is simply one of the three guest homes on the property & is larger than most peoples actual homes.
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William Hearst was a collector of art, antiques and artifacts. He collected everything from signed books, to paintings & statues all the way up to huge original carved wood ceilings which are centuries old. He would actually purchase full rooms from castles & estates in Europe and have them brought back to the states for his own home. The amount of antiques in this estate are absolutely mind blowing, we took just the Grand Rooms tour and in the four or five rooms we were shown, I saw more than I have at other museums. In fact there were even pieces that were older than when Christopher Columbus landed in America. He owned pieces from all over the world & from different points in time from places like Germany, Egypt, Spain, Italy & more.
This property is huge, so large in fact that the state parks offers seven different tours where you'll explore different areas of the house. Even if you take all seven tours, you will still not have seen the entire estate as parts of it can not be viewed on tours. We booked the Grand Rooms Tour in which we were able to see the outside of the guest cottages, the outdoor pool, four rooms inside the main castle, the movie theatre which he had inside of his house along with seeing the indoor roman bath.
The tour as a whole lasted about an hour & there was a short 15 minute drive up and down the hill side to the tourist center. If you were lucky you might see a few animals on the drive, while most of his zoo animals no longer reside on the property there are still some deer, mountain goat and even zebra herds which are descendants from his personal zoo that roam the property. It is also still a fully functional ranch so you'll see the huge heard of cows they have on the property.
As I had mentioned, prior to visiting I hadn't known a lot about the property or Mr. Hearst. We stopped by on a family vacation with my parents, and I am sure glad we did because my kids, my husband and myself were all blown away by this property. I'd love to go back and take some of the other tours to see what else lays behind the walls of this gorgeous estate. We learned a lot on our tour, the tour guides provide a ton of information and are happy to answer questions. The state is doing an amazing job keeping everything preserved and maintained on this property. Even the original gardens and fruit trees are well kept, the fruit growing on the property looked tasty! Plus while you are up on the hill top at the property, you will want to look out at the stunning views of the ocean that the estate offers. I can only imagine how spectacular it must have been to be invited to this property during its heyday.
If you ever happen to be in the area, I suggest stopping by to take one of the tours and see what Hearst Castle has to offer especially if you love art and antiques. Each of the tours has different prices & different tour lengths, when you go to purchase a ticket they will provide all of the information on the website.
If you are planning a trip to California & are looking for other activities to do feel free to type in "Things to do in California" in the search bar of my blog so you can find some other great activities in California. You can also click the "Things to do in California" link located on the right hand side of my blog/in this post. This was not a sponsored review, we paid to get into the state park ourselves. I enjoy being able to share spots like this with my readers who may not be able to visit in person but are still interested in learning more about these spots, or for anyone planning vacations in the area.
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