WHAT was once the home of former Prime Minister Adolfo Suarez, Spain’s first elected leader after the Franco dictatorship, is now a five-star boutique hotel.
When guests arrive at the Casa del Presidente they are ushered into a reception room that has all the hallmarks of the office of a powerful man; a large desk, a wall-to-wall bookcase filled with weighty tomes and black and white photos showing the same handsome, smiling face.
In one he is smirking with a cigarette in his mouth from a bench in Spain’s parliament. In another he and a young looking King Juan Carlos are standing together laughing over a shared joke. In a third, he is delivering a speech, the consummate statesman.
There is no doubt which “presidente” the house is named for – Adolfo Suarez the TV executive turned politician who piloted Spain’s bloodless transition from dictatorship to democracy.
During his four-and-a-half year tenure Suarez often used his country retreat in Avila to negotiate deals with ideologically opposed factions – from Francoist conservatives to the leader of the newly legalised Communist party.
The office – now reception – was the site of these highly charged political meetings. The eagle-eyed may spy the telltale seam in the bookcase that hints at the secret door hidden within the bookcase that leads to the kitchen, whether for late night snacks or to serve as an escape route should a political opponent turn nasty.
In a tour of the property, I am told that Suarez who was a proud native of Avila province, once played football in the gardens of the house when during the early years of Franco’s dictatorship it served as a youth centre.
Later, after making his fortune in Madrid, he returned to the city and bought the abandoned lot, renovating the property fully in the 70s. It served as the weekend escape from the official Prime Minister’s residence in Moncloa while Suarez was in office but by the mid-1990s, after his fortune was ravaged by attempts to seek a cure for the cancer that afflicted first his wife and then his daughter in expensive treatments abroad, it was repossessed by the bank.
What once was a country house and family home, has since been converted into the only five-star boutique hotel within the walls of Avila, and forms part of the Authentic Heritage Collection, a private- sector alternative to the state-owned Paradors group.
With just ten rooms, La Casa del Presidente manages to maintain the intimate atmosphere of a country house weekend break.
Breakfast is served in the old Suarez family kitchen, wine tasting in the cellar and during winter when the snow dusted peaks of the nearby Gredos are visible, cosy up in front of the hearth of an open fire lit each evening in the drawing room.
In the summer, there can be few places on the plains of Castilla more pleasurable to spend an afternoon than beside the pool in the shade of the mature trees that line the hotel’s garden.
There is even a private staircase climbing up to a walkway atop the three metre thick Medieval stone walls, whose crenellations dominate the view from those rooms overlooking the garden.
Each room is named after a value close to Suarez’s heart – such as Paz, Esperanza, Concordia, Alegria, and Libertad – and give off a classic yet understated vibe: think Chesterfield sofas, oriental rugs and rolltop baths.
The hotel experience is enough reason to turn the usual day trip to Avila from Madrid into a luxury minibreak, providing ample time to explore the city as well as the opportunity for a true culinary experience.
The hotel restaurant Caleña is open Thursday to Sunday and offers tasting menus that mix creativity with local ingredients that have already earned head chef Diego Sanz a Repsol Sol with speculation that his first Michelin star won’t be far behind.
Alas, the restaurant was closed when I visited on a Tuesday in mid-February, which only means I have at least one very good reason to return.
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