Now, I will talk about the second day of our trip to San Francisco. The first activity was a fabulous tour inside the Hearst Castle which is located in San Simeon, approximately 250 miles (400 km) from Los Angeles. "Miss Morgan, we are tired of camping out in the open at the ranch of San Simon and I would like to build a little something" Hearst said. Hearst was son of a very rich family, and his father had made his fortune when discovered silver in Nevada. The young William Hearst was brought up to believe he could do anything he wanted, and he did. Julia Morgan, a native Californian, designed the castle. She was the first woman with a degree in architecture. Hearst and Morgan's collaboration was destined to become one of the world's greatest attractions, and they planned and constructed his dream home. By 1947, they had created an estate of 165 rooms and 127 acres of gardens, terraces, pools and walkways. The estate's magnificent main house, "Casa Grande," and three guest houses are of Mediterranean Revival style, while the imposing towers of Casa Grande were inspired by a Spanish cathedral. The blending of the architectural style with the surrounding land, and Hearst's superb European and Mediterranean art collection, was so seamless that world-renowned architectural historian, Hearst enjoyed having guests at his home on the weekends, and to be invited there was an honor. However, guests had to follow three rules: do not get drunk; do not use bad language or tell off-color jokes; sleep in separate bedrooms if an unmarried couple. (This was ironic because Hearst himself had a mistress, named Marion Davies, with whom he spent most of his life). Food was not allowed in the rooms; if you wanted to eat, you had to go to the kitchen if you could find your way there. Guests did not see much of Hearst, who had a reputation for working hard and expected the same of his employees. He worked most of the day, seven days a week, on any one of his 27 newspapers, 138 magazines, or eight radio stations (not bad for a man who was asked to leave Harvard because he had too many incompletes). Nonetheless, this workaholic lifestyle didn't seem to cause him any harm; he lived to be 88.
Make no mistake about Hearst Castle, everything there is breathtaking, whether it's to your taste or not. After we took tour around the rooms, the halls, and pools, we watched movie about Hearst's life and castle. The tour inside the castle was approximately 5 hours. Then we left the castle driving to San Francisco. We stopped many times to watch seals and the fabulous scene of the Pacific Ocean. I drove more than 6 hours to SF.
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