Sunset on the enchanted hill

San Simeon, Calif. — THE sky had gone from blue to lavender and peach as twilight approached. I was in a bus that was climbing into the Santa Lucia Mountains in Central California. In front of us were stands of California oak and cypress trees and a smattering of grazing cattle. Behind us was the Pacific Ocean, now turning dark with the gathering dusk.

The bus stopped at the top of the hill, unloading us in front of William Randolph Hearst's 127-acre mountaintop retreat, La Cuesta Encantada (the enchanted hill), and we climbed stairs, emerging by the beautiful Neptune Pool just as the sky flared into a brilliant pink. The timing was so perfect that it almost seemed cinematic. Showman Hearst would have loved it.

I was on a special evening tour of Hearst Castle, offered in spring and fall, that was carefully orchestrated to take advantage of the region's colorful sunsets. The tours give guests an opportunity to see the beautifully lighted estate after dark and also let them experience something more -- a step back in time to the castle's 1930s heyday.

"The Ranch," as it was sometimes called, has a main house and three guesthouses: Altogether there are 56 bedrooms and 61 bathrooms. Originally built as the private residence of publisher and art collector Hearst, it is now a California State Park and offers several types of guided tours daily. I've tried nearly all of them, but I keep returning, as I did last month to sample the evening tour.

Hearst's 90,000-square-foot estate continues to fascinate me: the opulence, the history, the stories about his guests -- Chaplin, Cooper, Garbo, Colbert, Gable and Lombard, among them.

As my tour group of 18 rounded the pool, we realized we weren't alone. Chatting at water's edge were two couples. The women were both wearing dresses and gloves; one had a snood covering her hair and the other wore a fox stole, complete with head and tail. The men looked natty in suits.

The poolside foursome, we learned, were docents from the castle's Living History program, dressed in period costume.

"It's a way to bring the house alive," Hoyt Fields, museum director of Hearst Castle, told me later. "We're a historic house and we try to add to the experience with the docents. It's reminiscent of the times when Hearst was in residence in the '30s."