The tour now enters Casa Grande - but not via the front door.
This is the front door, or more precisely the floor of the entryway.
This is a very old mosaic (at least ancient Rome), and the traffic
over it was causing excess wear, so entry is now via a door on
the side, and this area is roped off from the public.
Another view of the front door from the inside. The people
in this photo are looking at the above mosaic. As with most of
the decorations, the walls are adorned with originals from Europe.
The front door is to the left of this photo. The walls are
covered with tapestries, and I expect the ceiling is from
some old castle in Europe. In the far corner there is an
elevator which Mr Hearst used to come down from his apartment
above after the guests had arrived and were settled in awaiting
their host for dinner.
The other end of the room - note the blank wall; the tapestry
from there is being refurbished.
The refectory (dining room to us mortals). The ceiling is genuine
European, as are the medieval flags which came from Sienna in Italy.
The table is set using typical furniture and place settings of the
Hearst family.
A closer view of the table. It's blurry because it was a long
exposure with a hand held camera. You can almost see the ketchup
bottle. These were standard table place settings, as Hearst
had a practical bent.
This doorway (and I'm sure it has quite a heritage story) leads
to the entertainment areas. Yes, plural is correct.
Obviously the pool/billiards room. The ceiling and tapestries
are all, as you would expect, European. Note that these are all
"false" ceilings. The building structure is reinforced concrete,
due to the earthquakes in this area. Indeed, one of the reasons
Hearst used the architect he did was that her buildings survived
the 1906 San Francisco earthquake quite well, so she obviously
had good ideas.
And what is complete without a movie theatre. Granted they
are becoming popular these days, but not on this sort of grand scale.
Hearst's companion, Marion Davies, was also a movie star
(silent only, I think), and so her movies were popular here!
The exit from the movie theatre was behind where the above
photo was taken. It comes out on the northern side of Case
Grande, and from there it's an easy stroll to the tennis
courts, and the indoor pool underneath the courts.
This is also a large pool, though nowhere near Olympic size.
It's also quite deep.
The other curious aspect of having 2 large pools is that
it was uncommon for people to know how to swim in the 1930s.
As such, a shallow pool makes a lot of sense. Many parts of
this pool are too deep to stand in.
Apart from the highly decorated diving board, the area behind it is
quite shallow, almost more for sitting/standing than swimming.
This is the last point on this tour - there was a bus waiting at the door to take us back to the visitor centre, and allow us to continue our journey to San Francisco.
Swimming Pool
Point Lobos State Park