Hearst Castle and the California coast

After our tours of the LA area, we moved our base of operations a little bit north to do some activities on the California coast.

A must-see attraction on the coast is Hearst Castle - built by William Randolf Hears, multimillionaire newspaper owner and (for more recent people) grandfather of Patti Hearst.  We learned that the plot of land (which he called "the ranch") of about 240,000 acres at San Simeon was owned by his family before he started the building.  His father had been involved with the California gold rush as a geologist and land speculator, so Hearst was already very rich before he got involved in newspapers.  He built the castle to entertain celebrities and the movers and shakers of the 20s and 30s.  It was also a place for this collections of European and Middle eastern/Egyptian art.

A few views of the castle.

It sits about 1,000 feet above the ocean, with wonderful views.

There was the "main house" for entertaining guests (with a movie every night) and three separate houses for Hearst's personal use and the use of his guests.  There was a huge heated pool with a Roman theme.

 Plus an indoor pool (under the tennis courts) with gold tile decorations.

It is said Hearst continued to work on different parts of his castle for over 20 years and never considered himself finished.  His family later donated it to the state of California, but the family continues to raise cattle on part of the land.

I'll give other information about our drive along the coast in a separate post.