Filoli vs. Hearst Castle

We visited another old mansion turned over to the public last week. This one was not nearly as eccentric as Hearst Castle (where he imported exotic animals and Mexican enchiladas), but very unique and beautiful in its own way.

A little history...for anyone interested.
Filoli is a 654 acre estate located on the eastern slope of the Coast Range mountains about 30 miles south of San Francisco. The Filoli estate was built by William Bowers Bourn II to resemble his Muckross estate in Ireland. The name Filoli comes from a credo Bourn admired: Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life. The Bourn family lived there from 1917-1937. The Roth family moved there in 1937 and took great care of the immense garden for which Filoli is now most famous for. In 1975 Filoli was gifted to the National Trust for Historic Preservation so all of us can enjoy it. I almost feel like I'm back to writing reports in 4th grade now.

On to the pictures.

Here's the sunken gardens with the pools.

This corridor of Irish Yew trees stretch out as far as the eye can see.

This is the knot garden. Impressive eh?!

Here we are admiring the little purple pansies (dressed in yellow gold). Anyone remember that Primary song?

Will only lasted in the stroller for the first half of the trip. Out of the stroller he got much more attention from the old ladies.

Here's some of the flowers that were blooming.

Lilacs are my favorite, but I want to go back to Filoli in time to see the HUNDREDS of different types of roses blooming. Let me know if you're interested in joining me!

Another random thought. What presently lived in mansions will be available for us to tour in the future? I'm hoping that the "Flinstone House" (seen northbound on 280 south of San Francisco) will eventually be open to the public. It was built in the 70s, and was recently painted terra cotta. What will their movie sound like? "When I saw this house I just shouted 'yabba dabba doo!' and I knew it was the one for me."


My guess for the next estate to be open to the public is MJ's Neverland Ranch. Sounds like he has a lot of debt, and it looks like the place is getting overgrown. I think this is in southern California. His place is more on the eccentric side like Hearst Castle. He also imported exotic animals. I'm sure they will somehow avoid controversy in the movie they show about the history of Neverland, and make it sound like such a noble place. The Hearst Castle movie was called "Building the Dream."

Anyone have any ricidulous mansions you'd like to tour? Or live in or whatever...