Biltmore Estate

If you have never visited the Biltmore Estate in Ashville, NC - you really need to go. Jimmy and I have been a number of times, including one evening tour that we did between Christmas and New Years.

Anyway, the first time we went to the Biltmore Estate, we parked directly in front of the home (kind of like guests driving up to see our friends the Vanderbilts!!!!). That was the good part of that trip. The bad part was that we locked the keys in the car. One of the security men wound up unlocking the car (with an unbent coat hangar no less).

I can only say that the estate has gotten better over time. Instead of buying your ticket at the front door, they have a really nice welcome center where the nice ladies will absolutely talk you into buying everything that they have to sell. Yes, I bought the audio tour package - and I would definitely advise doing so if you come to Ashville. You get an MP3 player which has the audio explanation of every room which is open to the public - on all five floors of the home (four floors of home and the basement). Plus, they have a short video to watch that gives first timers a little information about the estate.

Since 9/11 - you can no longer park directly in front of the house. But, they have really nice parking lots with shuttles to run you back and forth. However, since I needed the steps, Jimmy and I walked from the parking lot to the home. It was a really nice, shady walkway that led us directly to the overlooked at the end of the main lawn in front of the house. I took two pictures of the front of the house and then we went up to the main home.

I cannot describe the house. This was our first time to go on almost all of the floors. The last time we were here, there was a family member (or family) who stilled lived in some of the house - hence those rooms were closed to public tours. No one lives in the actual home now - so more of the house is now open. There are restoration projects going on currently, so there were rooms not open to the public which will be open within the next year. This was our first time to go above the second floor of the house since they were closed to the public our other visits. In fact, we didn't actually remember going into Mr. and Mrs. Vanderbilt's bedrooms before - so that might have been where the family lived at the time.

Of special interest on this trip was the carpet of flowers just off the side of the home. The area where the flowers were is just an open area which is used for various outside functions (like the BB King and Beach Boys concerts in August). Now, they have flats of flowers laid out on the space in very intricate patterns. I was kind of surprised that they were not actually planted - but they were not. You could see the flats under the plants if you got right up to it and looked. The walled gardens were not at their best, but they were still beautiful. There were lots of lots of butterflies. Of course, they were not in the butterfly garden where they were supposed to be - they were in the patterned area closer to the entrance. Jimmy was disappointed that the pots in the greenhouse were plastic - but I figured that was the least important thing that they had to worry about - plastic or clay!!!! They even had potato plants growing in the greenhouse. I doubt very many people had any idea that those were potato plants - you had to be from Mississippi to know that was what they were.

We did go to the winery. I was a bit disappointed. Napa has much better winery tours and tastings. It is, according to them, the most visited winery in the US. I guess that is because so many people come to the Biltmore Estate and you might just as well go to the winery for a tasting while you are there.

Anyway, I didn't take a lot of pictures. You can see more about Biltmore at their web site: www.biltmore.com I do suggest that you go on line and purchase your tickets on line - you save $5 a person. We don't have a printer on the RV - so I didn't buy them in advance. Of course, once I got there, I could have bought them and written down the confirmation number and they would have just looked it up for me. Pictures follow: