Once upon a time I was a young, broke graduate student. <cue violins> On trips to visit friends and family, my wife and I would skirt by Asheville, NC, and see the signs for Biltmore—and wish the pricey admission tickets were within our budget. </violins> Their prices don’t seem to have improved, but now we only live a couple hours away so—being somewhat less broke and significantly less young, and with only one of those factors changing consistently—we decided to splurge.

Tucked away on a tiny (125,000 acre) plot overlooking Asheville, Biltmore is stunningly, unbelievably, ginormously immense. Its room count is higher than the floor space of my first apartment, and its floor space is measured not in square footage but acres, as in 4. You read that correctly. Did I mention it was big?

The sense of wonder we felt was ever-present from our first view of the mansion presiding over a perfectly manicured, soccer field-sized lawn through the acres of beautiful gardens to the oiled and polished grandeur of the edifice itself. The Vanderbilts had taste and the wherewithal to indulge it.

We wandered through the gardens for a couple hours enjoying literally hundreds of varieties of roses from all over the world, vine-canopied stone walkways, and two large flower beds laid out in a very colorful rendition of Tiffany stained glass. The grounds reflect the same exquisite attention to detail displayed by the masonry, woodwork, tapestries, and other finery at which we marveled inside the main house.

And the interior is marvelous! Stone and wood floors, authentic French wallpapers, original and period furniture throughout—the definition of luxury. I imagined a cloud of cigar smoke hanging over the billiard table in the men’s parlor and the deep notes of the pipe organ towering above the formal banquet hall, but my favorite room was the library. Wall-to-wall and floor-to-vaulted-ceiling books. More than 10,000 volumes if I recall correctly. Rich embossed leather spines everywhere. I could spend weeks climbing the rolling ladders and wandering around the upper level balcony just poring over a collection like that!

But enough of the verbal tour. Have a look…and start planning a Biltmore trip of your own.