Cristina Macaya, a close friend of Don Juan Carlos and a key figure in Mallorca, dies

Surrounded by her family and on her farm Es Canyar, Cristina Macaya He died this Thursday at the age of 77, a victim of cancer that he had been fighting for a long time. The one who was president of the Red Cross for eleven years and an active collaborator of Proyecto Hombre was one of the most important figures on the island, where she met the King Juan Carloswith whom he maintained a great friendship.

great friend also marta gayawith whom the emeritus was related, Cristina defended the father of Felipe VI until the last of his days: “I have known Juan Carlos since I was little and I do not care if they say that I have gone with him. What they are doing is massacring a person who gave Spain an opening. That blonde I don’t know (Corinna Larsen) has done a lot of damage. But Spain would be a cat if Juan Carlos hadn’t done many things, believe me,” he said in one of his last interviews for ABC .

Cristina once married the businessman Javier Macayawith whom she had her four children (Sandra, Cristina, Javier and Maria), but also maintained a long relationship (17 years) with Placido ArangoMexican businessman and founder of Grupo Vips, who died in 2020: “I was only married once. Plácido and I got along very well, we knew how to give each other our space. Love has nothing to do with my life, they don’t change me I don’t even like being married,” said Cristina.

With a Galician father and a Sevillian mother, she was passionate about culture and emerging artists, and owned an impressive collection of works of art. Her environment defined her as a simple and very generous woman. In 2006, the United Nations awarded her the Women Together prize for her work to improve the living conditions of women imprisoned with her children.

He lived on horseback between New York, Madrid and Paris, but his heart was always in Mallorca: “I have always been attracted to the Island by its beauty, quality of life and its people.” Bill Clinton and his family, the Dukes of Kent, the designer Valentino, the artists Miguel Bosé and Van Morrison, Felipe González and Isabel Preysler have passed through her estate, Es Canyar.