Students and faculty of Providence Hall recently had a private, guided tour of Rancho del Cielo, the late President Ronald Reagan’s beloved ranch atop Refugio Canyon Road west of Santa Barbara.

The field trip occurred during a school retreat at nearby Rancho La Scherpa Conference Center.

Purchased in the mid-1970s as Reagan was leaving office as California’s two-term governor, the ranch sprawls across almost 700 mountaintop acres, with panoramic vistas of the Santa Barbara County coastline, the Channel Islands and the Santa Ynez Valley.

Reagan’s widow, former first lady Nancy Reagan, gave the ranch to the Young America’s Foundation, which uses the property for its educational programs.

As the tour progressed, Providence Hall students and faculty remarked on the unpretentious simplicity of the small ranch house — much of which was added to the original adobe structure by Reagan himself — that hosted close friends and world leaders alike.