As this is the time of year for showing your love, we’d love to extend a seasonal greeting to all of our beloved guests - those that have visited and will remain forever in our hearts, and those that are yet to come. Additionally, as 2018 has been our busiest year yet at La Cazalla, we wanted to share with you our favourite moments from what has proven to be both a very special and an extraordinary year. So Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Feliz Navidad, Happy Holidays, and Happy Festivus from all of us to all of you.
Here’s what happened at La Cazalla during 2018:
Our busiest year to date
This was the first year that we decided to open the house to guests for the entire year, including Christmas and New Year, and what a year it has been! Over 250 people came to stay with us, and we welcomed a further uncountable number as we hosted two weddings, a vow renewal, and a number of special celebrations for birthdays and family reunions. There were private flamenco shows and classes, yoga sessions, live bands, and even a very British afternoon tea party. To all of you, we shout out a huge, “THANK YOU!” for choosing La Cazalla as your perfect place to party. We love you all and hope to welcome you through the door again soon.
You can read what all of these lovely people had to say on our website reviews page here, but our favourite message of the year has to be this one:
Every storm cloud has a silver lining
It seems that unusual weather conditions have been experienced around the globe this year, and Andalusia was no exception. During parts of spring and autumn, the region experienced unprecedented deluges, to the point where we wondered if we would have to build an ark for all of our animals. However, this remarkable rainfall that re-sculpted the landscape around the property has resulted in some unexpected benefits.
Some of our former guests may be interested to discover that the bumpy track down to the property is no more. (For a time there, it actually was completely ‘no more’ and we were hiking out of the valley, but thank goodness that particular experience is in the past!) Anyway, here’s to less of this:
“Do not be put off by the bumpy road.”
- HomeAway guests from May 2018
and more of this:
A much smoother, faster ride into Ronda! In fact, we challenge our ‘serious cyclist’ from the summer to visit us again and revise this:
“The perfect base, you can cycle in/out at the top of the villa’s access track (or from the villa itself if you are a mountain biker, rather than roadie).”
to this:
“The perfect base, you can cycle in/out from the villa itself whether you are a mountain biker or a roadie.”
Challenge accepted, Scott?
Although, to be honest, our sentiments remain unchanged:
Then, for all you beach lovers out there that feel that Ronda is too far from the sand and the water to suit your tastes, we have our own beach right here on the property now. It’s the newest, hottest spot in town to sit and soak up some rays, accompanied by the sound of the river burbling by.
Sadly, the storms felled one of our oldest and most-magnificent oak trees, but this ancient soul that has watched over the magical threshing circle for so many years is to have its life extended. This glorious and enormous tree is to have its trunk and limbs remodelled into a tree house/viewing deck for our guests to watch over the wildlife at our luxury villa rental in Ronda. We hope for it to be a wonderful place from which to watch the birds and perhaps catch a glimpse of red deer as they limbo under the fence. True story. We can show you the night cam footage.
Our resident artist is certainly going to have her work cut out for her in recreating the nature trail!
Olive harvest 2018
Of course, autumn means olives here in Andalusia, and we were lucky enough to have the perfect weather for this year’s harvest. La Cazalla has around 50 olive trees of several different varieties, and we were delighted to see that even some of the saplings we planted earlier in the year produced their own little olives. So cute!
As we’d had such a lot of rain, the trees produced olives in abundance again and we sweated our way to a haul of 1,066 kg/2,350 pounds, which produced an amazing 160 litres/42 gallons of our delicious single-estate, entirely organic, extra virgin olive oil. Remember, every group of guests that stays with us receives their own complimentary bottle of olive oil, but as some of the local restaurants have already bought it in bulk to serve to their own guests, if you’d like to buy a bottle you’d better not delay!
A word to the wise: if you’re thinking about staying at our secluded, idyllic Andalusian retreat in 2019, stop thinking and book now. We are truly grateful to already have an unprecedented number of reservations confirmed for next year, leaving less than 28 weeks available. So why not treat your family and/or friends to a very special Christmas present and reserve a stay at La Cazalla de Ronda for you all. You won’t regret it.
We wish you all a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year, and hope to see you sometime soon!