This past weekend I finally managed to get down to San Jose to take a tour of the
Winchester Mystery Mansion. This had been somewhat of a childhood dream destination of mine ever since I saw a brief documentary about it on one of those history or discovery channel shows. For those of you that don't know what it is, basically it's a house with a ton of rooms, strangely placed doors, windows, and other structures. The story goes that Sarah Winchester, widow and inheritor of the Winchester rifle estate, believed that she need to have continuous construction on her house to appease the ghosts of the people who were killed by Winchester rifles over the years. The results were this superbly bizarre house.
While the entrance to get your tickets (conveniently placed within the gift shop) is a bit on the over-polished-truck-stop side, the actual tour of the house is pretty freaking spectacular. The tour guide had her schpiel down pat and moved the group through pretty efficiently, but with enough time to inspect things on your own without feeling rushed. Unfortunately photography is not allowed inside the mansion, but below are a couple of shots I snapped with my phone of the exterior.
One thing I would recommend avoiding however, is the "Behind The Scenes" tour. It may seem like a deal only being an additional $5 more than the the Mansion tour, but it's really just completely pointless. The only thing on this portion of the tour that you can't explore on your own is the basement, which is surprisingly run-of-the-mill. Save yourself $5 and skip this part.
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