Why La Donaira in Andalusia is the perfect weekend escape

The road to La Donaira is a brief and unassuming one, a short drive from the quaint Andalusian town of El Gastor. The two might only be three kilometres apart but upon our arrival the difference could not have been more marked. El Gastor was in the thick of celebrating carnival (we spotted revellers in cow onesies and girl scout costumes), while in contrast, as we were shuttled up to the estate by the absurdly handsome general manager, Manu, all was calm and had us longing for a peaceful night’s sleep.

We were in luck. Although La Donaira’s cortijo, or farmhouse, dates back nearly 100 years, the current owner, an Austrian entrepreneur, has spent the past 12 years lovingly restoring the property in cool Iberian style. There’s the sleek new spa with two pools, a hammam and delicious-smelling soaps and home-made tinctures. Each of the eight rooms boasts the comfiest mattresses, walk-in showers or freestanding copper tubs, blankets sourced from the local town of Grazalema and a coffee-table book collection so vast it would impress the boffins at the Bodleian.

The plan was to spend our first day on the road, visiting Ubrique — famed for its excellent leather goods and Louis Vuitton factory — and sampling sherry in Jerez. But we found ourselves rained in and made do with the company of the farm’s house chef, Marco, who trained in some of the best kitchens in San Sebastian, as he prepped our pasture-to-plate-style lunch.

With more than 250 hectares of land by the foothills of the Ronda Mountains, the farm produces everything that comes out of the kitchen, from the olive oil to the meat from the property’s own herd of Pajuna cows. One can think of worse things than being marooned here, feasting on home-made spinach ravioli, fresh garden salads and a goat’s cheese-and-potato soup topped with crisp Iberian ham.