The name Alisal means “sycamore grove” in Spanish. This is old California,the California of farmers and ranchers, the California that people struggled westward in wagon trains to settle. Alisal, an important piece of California history, is in the spectacular Santa Ynez Valley just over the mountains from Santa Barbara. Now home to a number of wineries, the Santa Ynez has long been an agricultural valley, and the residents today work very hard to defend it and keep it that way.

In 1843, thirty-nine years after the Spanish padres established Mission Santa Inés, Conquistador Raimundo Carrillo received the 13,500-acre Rancho Nojoqui land grant as payment for his services to the Mexican government. Carrillo immediately began raising cattle, a tradition that continues at Alisal today.

Subsequent owners the Pierce family bred harness racing’s legendary trotter Lou Dillon. Horse and cattle breeder Charles Perkins bought the property in 1927 and raised Kentucky Derby winner Flying Ebony.

Once opened as a guest ranch in 1946, Alisal became a retreat for some of Hollywood’s best-known citizens such as Groucho Marx and Gregory Peck. Clark Gable was married to Lady Sylvia Ashley here. But it is the fact Alisal has not changed that much and continues to be a working cattle ranch and farm that attracts many. There are no phones or television in the rooms, and cell phone coverage is non-existent. It is quite simply a place to retreat from a far too fast-paced world and be refreshed in old California. The bungalows and accommodations are classic California ranch style, low slung and tucked in the shade of the oaks to keep them cool.

As guests would expect from a California ranch, there are horses, tennis, golf, and world-class bass fishing in a 100-acre spring fed lake that is one of the best bass lakes in California. With all natural spawn and wild fish that are catch-and-release only, the quality of the fishery only gets better with each passing year. Depending on the time of day, anglers can fish for bass on top, which to the dedicated bass angler is the epitome of largemouth bass fishing. Guides in modern bass boats put angling guests right on top of the best fishing holes in the lake.

Modern California has a mystique that beckons some and repels others. It is too big, too fast, too expensive, and sooner or later it’s going to fall into the ocean. But there is a reason that over the years, people flocked to California. There was something magical about the climate, there was great hope; California was the promised land. It was Shangri-La. Nothing has changed at Alisal. Shangri-La still exists here, and old California still beckons.