CITY BREAK: Santiago de Compostela, Spain
It wasn't what I was expecting. I came to Santiago as a kind-of, sort-of pilgrim, and the picture of the city in my head was set by Santiago's fame as the great medieval centre of pilgrimage. I'd seen present-day Santiago pilgrims walking the 'Way of St James', the chemins de St Jacques, in south-west France. Well, they had been walking. I had been sitting comfortably under an umbrella in a sweltering marketplace, sipping icy beer, while they tramped on wearily through with their walking sticks and cockleshell badges, heading south in the heat and the dust.
I'd thought it must be olive groves and basking lizards all the way. I'd imagined a destination that would be a kind of summit of Mediterranean heat. I hadn't realised that the pilgrim roads that thread their way to Santiago from all over Europe lead the pilgrims, at their end, into a pocket of the wet west.
One hundred and fifty days a year, rain falls on Santiago de Compostela. Two dry days in a row is perfectly feasible; three begins to be a bit of a challenge to the probabilities. It's as wet as the west of Ireland, or the west of Wales, or the west of Scotland. But then it, too, up in the north-west corner of Spain, faces the Atlantic weather, just inland from a craggy shore where the clouds file in to drizzle down their loads. Coming to Santiago by plane in springtime, you descend into a landscape that feels a planet away from the scorch of Andalucía or the arid air of Madrid: a green landscape of little rounded hills, with boulders in the fields and quick brooks running along between trees.
As I strolled into the city on a March day of clear skies and soft, damp air, there were bagpipes playing in the narrow granite streets. Not the Scottish kind, but Galicia's own droning gaita. In the ancient centre of the city, tilted down a westward slope so that green hills rise beyond the rooftops, the houses are tall and grey, built for the rain, with white plaster facings over the stonework and glassed-in galleries upstairs. It looked like nothing I associate with Spain.
To be honest, it looked like Brecon. Or, to allow for the sea nearby, like Aberystwyth. Only not Aberystwyth as it actually exists; a fantasy Aberystwyth, an Aberystwyth as it would have been if some enterprising Welsh prince a thousand years ago had claimed to find the body of one of Jesus's disciples in it, and been believed, and then half the population of medieval Europe had travelled there, and spent all their money once they arrived.
Round about 900AD, when Christian Spain was reduced to a thin line of hill-kingdoms across the very top of the peninsula, with the confident armies of Islam pressing up from below, the ruler of Galicia made the incredibly useful discovery that an old Roman tomb not far from the sea was actually the sacred sepulchre of the Apostle James.
As the pilgrims flooded into Santiago, making it the biggest draw in Christendom after Rome, the banners of the saint drove south across Spain with the Christian counter-attack, the Reconquista. Lots of paintings of St James show him on horseback, swordin hand, smiting enemies in turbans. Whichever way you looked at him - spiritually, economically, geopolitically - he was an asset. His tomb turned the back of beyond into one of the hubs of the world.
In between the grey-andwhite rainproof houses, Santiago is monumental, Santiago is grand, rearing up into mighty edifices paid for by a millennium of alms. It isn't a big city, even now, but it has convents and priories and nunneries and friaries and 40 churches, all executed on a large scale, in towering masses of the same local stone.
In Santiago, the 16th-century style called 'plateresque', in which the flat face of a building is carved like a book-page, turns strangely clean and modernistic, as if Charles Rennie Mackintosh had been transported to the Renaissance by time machine. The colour of the stone varies depending on the light. Sometimes it's green, sometimes it's brown, sometimes it's gold; and sometimes it's just dark and dripping.
At the centre of the old city, the tight slots of the streets open out spectacularly onto the Praza do Obradoiro, which has granite grandeur on every side of it, a complete ensemble of weighty splendour. If you stand here, you can watch a steady trickle of present-day pilgrims arriving.
It's baroque on the outside; baroque local-style. It climbs in tier above tier of columns, cupolas, pilasters, niches for statues, pediments, stone gazebos, fretted ziggurats and spires, all encrusted with inventive second thoughts, and third and fourth and fifth ones. It reaches heavenward as complicatedly, if you try to tally its parts, as a stack of ornamental clocks. But the granite solidifies it all into a mountain, water-streaked and speckled and lichen-coated and verdigris-crusted right the way up, with clumps of grass and even saplings attached to inaccessible ledges.
I was staying in the intensely pleasurable setting of the parador. It used to be a hospital, as well as the shelter at journey's end for the very grandest of pilgrims, and it is laid out, behind the formidable façade, to generate the 16th-century version of a soothing calm. Two of its courtyards are paved, with central fountains laying down slow rivulets of sound, and two have gardens in them, with mossy stone pavilions at their centres, surrounded by bushes the rich submarine green of watercress. The rooms, high up above the slender cloister-arches, are splendid rather than boutique-hotel slick, with four-posters in many, and tapestry hangings and reproduction El Grecos on the walls.
It's a fine city for foodies, for instance, up there with Bologna for the reliable deliciousness with which ordinary restaurants execute the regional classics, and there's a firmament of starrier dining up above, with the accent on seafood.
I strolled the granite alleys, admiring the sprays of blossom on the trees where the roads widened; and in their windows, the bars displayed ruddy octopus tentacles, and crabs in tanks, and toothy hake two feet long on beds of crushed ice, ferocious-looking enough to justify you eating them before they tried to eat you.
I'm not a Catholic, but I wanted the cathedral to speak to me anyway. I wanted to feel a little of what the pilgrims feel, without the thousand-mile workout first. Dutch writer Cees Nooteboom talks about the sensation, in Santiago, of joining the great river of other people's belief, whether you yourself believe or not; and since I do believe, in a Northern European Protestant sort of a way, I was looking out for something of that kind, for the current of the pilgrims' faith to pick me up and carry me along as I followed them up the zigzag stairs to the west door.
The centuries the cathedral had traversed to get here seemed to have slid suddenly into view. It was journeying in time; and I could picture it, a few hundred years further on, wrapped up in new layers of architecture, in some iridescent sheath of nanotech, but still transacting its ancient and necessary business.There were crowds on the square the next morning: one horde of pilgrims in green baseball caps and another in maroon cloaks. I looked up to say farewell to the cathedral, but heavy wet splotches were appearing on the granite paving. Right on schedule, it had started to rain.
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TRAVEL GUIDE TO SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, SPAIN
As a weekend destination, this beautiful small city - Galicia's grand cathedral capital - has much to recommend it. It has been a big draw for pilgrim tourists for more than 1,000 years. It is a compact old town, crammed with historic buildings, is closed to traffic and entirely negotiable on foot. Being the capital of Galicia - a region with its own language, sense of identity and renowned cuisine (based largely around fresh fish) - it gives even a short visit a piquant taste of adventure.
Where to stay in Santiago de Compostela
HOTEL DOS REIS CATOLICOS
Praza do Obradoiro 1 (00 34 981 582 200; fax: 563 094). The classic choice in Santiago. If not the oldest hotel in the world, it is certainly one of them. Of the three suites, just one has views onto the square and Julio Iglesias stays there when he is in town. ££VIRXE DA CERCA HOTEL
Rua Virxe da Cerca 27 (00 34 981 569 350; fax: 586 925) and Hotel San Clemente (Rua San Clemente 28; 00 34 981 569 260; fax: 586 626) are both part of a small local chain, Pousadas de Compostela. The first is the smarter (and chintzier) of the two, while Hotel San Clemente is a simpler urban option. £AC PALACIO DEL CARMEN
Rua Oblatas (00 34 981 552 444; fax: 552 445; www.ac-hotels.com). The city's newest luxury option, housed in the old convent of Las Oblatas. The hotel's scruffy surroundings do not match the elegance of the interior. Amenities include a pool, sauna/Turkish bath, fitness centre and gardens. £
The best restaurants in Santiago de Compostela
Galician specialities include pulpo a feira (octopus salad dressed with olive oil and paprika), lacon con grelos (boiled ham with turnip tops) and all kinds of fresh seafood washed down with fine local white wines such as Ribeiro and Albariño. In the universe of Spanish regional cuisines, la cocina gallega has a reputation for simplicity and excellence, emphasizing the quality of its raw materials over culinary technique.
RESTAURANTE ROBERTOSan Xulián de Sales, Vedra (00 34 981 511 769; fax: 511 894). A restored 19th-century pazo (Galician country house) about 7km outside Santiago. Roberto Crespo is the man in charge. His cooking is luxurious but relatively simple, giving a twist to traditional Galician dishes. Try vieiras (scallops) oven-roasted in their shells with Albariño wine, turbot with potatoes and mushrooms, local beef sirloin with shiitake, foie gras and pine nuts. The ambience of the restaurant, well upholstered and rather old-fashioned, makes it perhaps more suitable for dinner than lunch.
CASA MARCELO Rúa das Hortas 1 (00 34 981 558 580; fax: 554 762; www.casamarcelo.net). Marcelo Tejedor's restaurant has just nine tables and is open only from Wednesday to Saturday (lunch and dinner). The place hums with youthful enthusiasm and Marcelo himself is a constant presence, darting from open-plan kitchen to dining room. His daily visit to the market dictates the nature of the day's menu degustacion. Inventiveness and vibrant flavours are assured, as is value for money.
TOÑI VICENTEAvenida Rosalía de Castro 24 (00 34 981 594 100; fax: 593 554). Toñi Vicente is the great original in the world of cocina gallega. Relying on local ingredients, particularly seafood and vegetables, she constructs satisfying dishes that are clever without being at all attention-seeking. Spanish food critics rave over her steamed sea bream with wild rice and basmati, which is delicious yet essentially simple.
O ASESINO Praza Universidade 16 (00 34 981 581 568). The dining room at 'The Murderer' is that of an old-fashioned eating house, crammed with memorabilia and mismatched furniture. Run by the same family for 50 years, it is popular with students from the halls of residence nearby. Don't expect any culinary marvels to emerge from the tiny kitchen; this is plain Galician home cooking, but none the worse for that. Fried pimientos de Padron, fresh sardines, hake a la gallega (with garlic and paprika) and tarta de Santiago (almond cake) are all freshly made.
CAFE LITERARIOS 1 Quintana de Vivos (00 34 981 565630).Situated in the historic centre of the city this cafe is steeped in history and is next door to the cathedral. When it's good weather take a seat outside on the terrace and have a drink; a pleasant place for people-watching near the cathedral.
Things to do in Santiago de Compostela
HISTORY
Like Venice, Santiago has a venerable history as a tourist destination. Ever since the miraculous discovery of the tomb of the Apostle Saint James by Bishop Theodomir in the year 813AD, the city has attracted pilgrims in droves. 'So great is the multitude that comes and goes that there is barely enough space on the pavement,' wrote the 12th-century commentator Ali Ben Yusuf. Tourist-pilgrims, or pilgrim-tourists, are more than ever a feature of the city's human landscape, along with students (Santiago is a major university town).PRAZA DO OBRADOIRO
City life revolves around the Praza do Obradoiro, the monumental square whose grandeur puts it up there among the great historic plazas and piazzas of the world, from Siena to Mexico City. The Obradoiro's four sides are said to represent not only the four great architectural styles (Gothic, Renaissance, baroque and neoclassical) but also the four main constituents of civic life: politics (the Town Hall), religion (the Cathedral), culture (the Rectorate of Santiago University) and economy (the Hotel dos Reis Católicos).CATHEDRAL OF SAINT JAMES
Wherever you are staying in Santiago, the Cathedral of Saint James will soon come to be a familiar presence. The western façade, dominating the Praza do Obradoiro, is by some way the most astonishing piece of building in the city. Its ensemble of soaring towers, arches and windows, festooned with architectural frills, changes colour and personality depending on the light that falls on it, now amiably golden, now coldly grey. It is worth going back to the cathedral as often as you feel drawn to it for the sheer scale and richness of its interior, not to mention the wealth of its artworks and treasures; which are hard to digest in a single mouthful.Within a few hundred yards from the Praza do Obradoiro are enough churches and museums to satisfy even the hungriest culture vulture. Behind the cathedral's northern flank is the church of San Martiño, part of a vast Benedictine monastery complex, now a seminary. It is little visited - unjustly so.
THE MARKET
The central market is also worth a wander, as a reminder of Santiago's rural roots. It was built to resemble a Romanesque basilica, in the same grey granite used throughout the city. The fish section has the best of the Atlantic catch, which in terms of quality beats the Mediterranean hands down. Bakeries offer not only the traditional Galician bread (a crusty sourdough type, which keeps for a week) but wheat and rye seed for growing your own.CARBALLEIRA DE SANTA SUSANA
This beautifully-landscaped park, where the old men sit on ironwork benches and chat away the afternoons, is well worth a visit. From here there is a startling view of the Praza do Obradoiro and the great cathedral, rearing up dramatically out of the old town.
How to get to Santiago de Compostela
AIRPORT Lavacolla airport, 11km south-east of Santiago, caters to international flights and flights to Madrid, Barcelona and Malaga.
AIRLINES
Iberia (0845 601 2854; www.iberia.com) flies daily from Heathrow to Santiago de Compostela.
Ryanair (www.ryanair.com) flies to Santiago de Compostela from Stansted or Liverpool.Keytel International (020 7953 3020; www.keytel.co.uk) is the UK representative of the paradors of Spain; it can assist with route planning and reservations.