How do I block dates for myself?

Block them by hand from your calendar. A blocked date behaves like a booked one: guests cannot select it on your website, and it holds until you release it.

Use this for anything that is not a paying guest — your own stays, the fortnight your family visits, a maintenance week, the gap you keep between bookings for cleaning.

One thing to be careful about. Blocking a date here stops it being sold here. It does not automatically close it on every platform you are listed on, because those platforms read your availability from their own sources on their own schedule. If a week matters, block it everywhere you are listed rather than trusting the sync to carry it in the direction you assume.

If someone has asked to hold dates while they decide, blocking is the wrong tool — you will forget why the week is closed. Enter it as an offline booking with their name instead, and cancel it if they do not confirm. You keep the reason attached to the dates.

The most expensive calendar mistake is not a missing block; it is a block nobody ever removed. Dates quietly closed for a maintenance job finished last spring look exactly like a quiet season. It is worth scanning ahead once a month.