Ojai Valley Inn

A 220-acre Spanish Colonial resort in California's Ojai Valley, built around a 1923 George C. Thomas Jr. golf course, with a 31,000 sq ft spa and grounds that played Shangri-La in Lost Horizon.

In Frank Capra’s 1937 film Lost Horizon, Shangri-La is the grounds of Ojai Valley Inn. The place started as a golf course. In 1923 Edward D. Libbey built a private country club in the Ojai Valley, with a course by George C. Thomas Jr. and Billy Bell and a Spanish Colonial clubhouse by Wallace Neff. A two-storey inn of 22 rooms followed in 1934, drawn from Neff’s plans, and those rooms are now the Wallace Neff Estate Rooms. The resort covers 220 acres.

The course was shaped without heavy equipment. It is 18 holes and 6,292 yards, on site and run by the hotel. It hosted seven Senior PGA Tour events, with Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, Gary Player and Ben Crenshaw among the players, and Jimmy Demaret and Doug Sanders were resident professionals. In 1945 Bing Crosby and Bob Hope played an exhibition match on the club’s nine-hole course. Hotel guests pay a lower rate than day guests, and nine-hole rounds are offered.

The standard Ojai Luxury Room is 425 sq ft. The larger options include spa penthouses and Casa Elar, a villa of 10,407 sq ft. Dinner is at Olivella, the signature restaurant, or at The Oak, and Jimmy’s Pub is named after Demaret.

Spa Ojai opened in 1997 and covers 31,000 sq ft. The resort also runs tennis, hiking, biking, horseback riding and art classes, plus Camp Oak for children.