“Winchester Mystery House”
in San Jose. This was a house build by the widow of the
second president of the Winchester Repeating Rifle Co. A psychic convinced her that her
husband and her daughter died young because of the spirits of those killed by Winchester
rifles. The only way to appease these spirits, she was told, was to move to the west and to
build a house that was never completed. She bought an eight-room farmhouse west of what
was then San Jose, and started adding on and remodeling in the early 1880’s, and it
continued until she died in 1922. The result is a 168-room house that is very quirky. There
are doors that open onto solid walls, stairs that go nowhere, etc., etc. All in all, it was very
interesting.
Leaving San Jose, we headed down to the Big Sur area south of Monterey. The scenery is
One of the advantages of traveling in February is that there are no big crowds. When we
spectacular. We got down as far as the Julia Pfeiffer State Park, and here we are settled
for the night. We got here about 3:30, so we have had a little time to wander around,
seeing the huge redwood trees that are here, and even some time to sit and look at the Big
Sur River while having a beer with cheese and crackers. Now this is what a vacation should be
about.
Monday, February 7, 2000
Last night was a very quiet and comfortable night. We got up this morning to a beautiful
day, and just took our time fixing breakfast and getting our things ready to hit the road
again. Not long after we left the campground, we got into the notorious Big Sur fog. For
most of the trip from the campground to San Simeon the fog obscured the scenery (and in
some places, even the road). Occasionally, there was enough of a break to see what we were
missing. This is a coastline that we will have to travel again in hopes that other parts of the
view will be visible.
got to San Simeon, we went to get unreserved tickets for the
Hearst Castle
tour, we were afraid that we might have to wait a long time (or even
not get any at all). As it turned out, we only had a 30-minute wait, and that time was spent
productively by reading a little about the family history at the visitors center. The tour
itself was very impressive. Linda had seen the castle before, and she was still impressed by
it. I had not seen it before, and was in awe. The external images speak for themselves.
Inside, it was too dark to get any pictures, but the art that was both built into the
structure and that that was displayed were incredible. Just the tapestries left me
speechless, and then there was the silver, the architectural features like ceilings, doors and
columns. It was all a pretty amazing way for Hearst to spend some of his money.
