Hearst Castle is dressing up for the holidays, but one favorite tour is still missing

Hearst Castle staff began the monument’s annual gear-up for holiday tours Wednesday, hauling up from basement cubbies the two 18-foot-tall trees for the Assembly Room, wreaths so big you can almost walk through them and so much more.

Again this year, California State Parks won’t offer its popular night tours for the holidays. However, tours at twilight through mid-evening will be available, according to Cara O’ Brien, the park’s museum director.

The holiday night tours have been off the tour schedule since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

O’Brien said one holiday change this year is the conversion of the tree toppers back to plug-in power. The ones being tested last year were battery powered.

The new ones, which look nicer than last year’s, are quite similar to the ones used in the Castle’s heyday, she said. The plug-in versions also are much easier and safer to use.

“Changing batteries on a tree topper that’s at 18-feet up is tricky,” O’Brian said.

All of the Castle’s Christmas lights are LED, including the new star toppers, O’Brien said, as are all but 25 of the 2,042 light bulbs turned on every day along the daily tour routes inside the buildings. Besides the towering trees in the Assembly Hall, the Castle’s holiday decor includes two that are 8 feet tall and two 6 footers.

Why no holiday night tours at Hearst Castle?

O’Brien said Thursday that the continuing lack of night tours, which featured costumed docents played the parts of William Randolph Hearst and his guests, is due in part to traffic restrictions caused by continuing roadwork that restricts to one lane a section of the steep route leading to the estate.

“The roadwork limits how many buses we can get through in an hour,” she said. “Day security does road control right now, so the road project affects all departments, not just the guide program.”

Staffing has been an issue on the hilltop for some time, but that situation is improving, O’Brien said.

At one point, the guide staff that usually includes about 80 highly trained people to lead the tours was down to about 65, according to Dan Falat, superintendent of the district that includes Hearst Castle.

An advertising and PR push has just about filled that roster, O’Brien said Monday.

While guests won’t get to see docents reenacting the holidays at the Castle, they can catch the lights and decorations after dark.

The Twilight Tours, which start Nov. 24, will be offered Friday and Saturday nights until Dec. 15, at which time they’ll be offered every night through Dec. 30.

Those tours run 4 to 8 p.m. and include a guest house, the gardens, Casa Grande’s grand social rooms, the kitchen and theater and both pools. The 2/3-mile tours require navigating about 190 steps.

Adult and accessibility tickets, $35, and junior tickets, $17, can be bought at the Castle website or by calling 1-800-444-4445.

Attendance down and Highway 1 closure takes the blame.

Another road project — the stubborn landslide-caused closure of Highway 1 near Big Sur since December — was a primary reason why the number of tour-takers was down 17% this summer, Falat said.

Actual attendance June through September 2023 was 184,000 and change, while nearly 222,500 tickets were sold during the same period in 2022.

Gas prices, foggy weather at the shore and other environmental factors also played a part.

On the upside, “we’ve seen a lot of people taking multiple tours on the same day,” Falat said.