Visiting the Biltmore Estate has been on my bucket list for awhile. I have a thing for Gilded Age Mansions specifically, and home tours in general. Each time I visit one, the guide or someone on the tour asks, “have you been to Biltmore?”

That’s why I decided to go.

It’s the largest private residence in the U.S., sitting on 125,000 acres of land. The actual house, a French Renaissance chateau (it looks like a church) is 175k square feet with 250 rooms, 43 bathrooms and 65 fireplaces.