October in Spain

A family holiday of driven partridges and Spanish hospitality.

When each of our four daughters became engaged, I gave her prospective husband a shotgun. There was a condition attached: He had to learn to use it. One already knew his way around a clay ground; the others had never pulled a trigger. All four learned so well that I sometimes wonder whether I should have been less generous with the instruction.

My wife, Nina, is an excellent shot, as are our daughters. Consequently, a family holiday can produce an entire line of Guns. For several years we have spent a week shooting in Scotland or Spain, accompanied by my closest friend from the Netherlands and his wife. He and I have known each other for 75 years. At that stage, friendship requires very little explanation.

This October we returned to Spain, where the arrangements accommodate our differing ideas of relaxation. Some favor a siesta after shooting. Two of our sons-in-law regard that as time wasted when there might be a stag somewhere requiring their attention.

Nina and I arrived in Madrid ahead of the others, giving ourselves time to recover from jet lag and the local retailers an opportunity to benefit from our presence. We stayed at the boutique Hotel Orfila. Once the children arrived, we gathered for dinner at O’Pazo, where the seafood was outstanding and the bill surprisingly reasonable by American standards.

On Sunday we drove to Finca San Bruno, in Ciudad Real province. Our friends Javier and Carla Torrico welcomed us in the courtyard of their house, which has 14 en-suite bedrooms and the agreeable atmosphere of a home where guests are expected to enjoy themselves. The entrance hall holds a remarkable collection of wild boar trophies taken on the estate.

After lunch, two sons-in-law were already discussing fallow deer with Javier. Soon they departed with Carla’s nephew, Luis, who is finishing university in Madrid. His excellent English and easy manner make him particularly good company. The hunters returned successful, establishing a pattern that would persist throughout the week.

The daughters prefer sharing pegs. They alternate drives, enjoy one another’s company and spare their shoulders some punishment. Watching them together is among my greatest pleasures on these trips. There is plenty of shooting, but there is also time to laugh, compare a memorable bird and enjoy being sisters without the usual demands of home.

Traveling with an established family party also means knowing everyone’s habits and abilities. Shared pegs suit our daughters, while the stalkers can arrange their extra outings without reorganizing the holiday for everyone.

Our guns were a mixture of 20- and 28-bores, brought from the United States. The estates offer guests guns, including over-and-unders and side-by-sides, but my years in the fine-gun business have left me particular about fit. A familiar gun is worth some advance organization.

At San Bruno, each Gun has a loader and a secretario, who records the birds and helps recover them afterward. Dogs assist with retrieving. My secretario’s enthusiasm suggested that he took my successes personally, which made me all the more anxious to give him something worth celebrating.

The beaters announce their approach enthusiastically. Ahead of them, the gamekeeper and his assistants ride magnificent horses, supervising the drive. Their elevated position reinforces the importance of shooting only with clear sky behind the bird and observing the estate’s prescribed shooting limits. Steel plates beside the pegs mark boundaries that deserve everyone’s respect.

My grandfather taught me gun safety first, and I passed that priority to our children. No bird improves a day enough to justify a questionable shot.

I also try to discourage competition over numbers. Before the early drives I allocated birds among the Guns, encouraging everyone to choose the opportunities they found most challenging. Those are the birds remembered afterward. A difficult crossing partridge can occupy the mind pleasantly long after the easier chances have disappeared from memory.

Between drives came tapas and unhurried conversation. Iberian ham seems to taste better in Spain, though I have conducted enough research to know that further investigation is warranted. Threatening rain influenced our first day’s arrangements, but held off until later.

Back at the house, most of us welcomed a siesta. Our two indefatigable hunters went stalking again. Eventually everyone assembled for cocktails on the terrace, looking across rocky hills before dinner. Spain makes it remarkably easy to feel that a day has been properly used.

The next morning brought rockier footing and, later, more wind. The partridges came fast, and I managed a double on each of four drives, to my secretario’s considerable satisfaction. By the close of our shooting at San Bruno, we were comfortably within the agreed bag.

For our final dinner, the men wore ties. In such surroundings, and with hosts so generous, dressing for the evening seemed a small and appropriate courtesy.

Our next destination, Finca El Palomar in Albacete province, was about two hours away. I first visited roughly 25 years ago, and the Flores family have become dear friends. Samuel hosted us, while his parents, Samuel Sr. and Lily, and his sister Isabelle came from Madrid to see us. Members of the next generation joined our farewell dinner.

The family combines shooting with an extensive agricultural business and breeding fighting bulls for Spanish corridas. There is much here to interest anyone curious about the working countryside, and the house contains some decidedly unusual trophies.

El Palomar offered a welcome change of terrain. Hills and rock formations gave the partridges opportunities to appear suddenly and pass with disconcerting speed. A bird could be behind you before you had properly settled the question of its arrival.

My old Dutch friend and I maintained our policy of selective shooting, which supplied a respectable explanation for our modest contribution. The younger members needed fewer explanations. During five drives, with lunch on the terrace between morning and afternoon shooting, they steadily made up the difference.

Our sons-in-law also pursued red deer and mouflon. Their enthusiasm survived every full day on the partridge line, culminating in an Iberian ibex. Experienced estate staff accompanied them throughout, selecting suitable animals before authorizing a shot.

By our final day, everyone seemed thoroughly settled. Guns moved confidently, birds flew hard, and the bag finished where it should. Across the visit we accounted for approximately 2,000 partridges, while the stalkers enjoyed opportunities for several species between the driven days.

Yet when I think about another October in Spain, arithmetic has little to do with it.

I think of our daughters sharing a peg, of Nina shooting well, and of husbands who accepted a shotgun as part of their introduction to the family and have made excellent use of it. I think, too, of a friendship lasting three-quarters of a century and the Spanish families whose welcome has grown warmer with every visit.

A family shooting holiday depends on much more than the birds. It needs places where people are comfortable together, enough variety to satisfy different appetites and hosts who understand the pleasure of gathering everyone around a table at day’s end.

At San Bruno and El Palomar, we found all of that. My only miscalculation was teaching the sons-in-law so thoroughly. Next time, perhaps I shall introduce them to the siesta.