Of course, you are supposed to arrive at Santiago de Compostela after a pilgrimage of several hundred miles - on foot, or at least a donkey. You are not really meant to jet in for a weekend break and stay in a posh hotel. But such is the poverty of my spiritual life that I just did not have the necessary time to spend hiking from the fleshpots of London to the green hills of Galicia.

Santiago de Compostela, nestled in a natural wooded bowl in the lush landscape of north west Spain, is the Catholic Church's holiest site outside the Vatican. Since the ninth century, this tiny city in has been welcoming pilgrims at the end of the Camino de Santiago which runs from the French border at St Jean Pied de Port through various Spanish holy sites. This makes it Europe's oldest tourist resort.

There is something immediately rejuvenating about the light and air of southern European as you step off the plane. In fact, this is the perfect place to spend a few days and small enough that you can get to see pretty much everything on offer in that time.

Arriving at Santiago on a Sunday without a map or guide is not ideal, but we found that there was something about the place that meant that if you wander around aimlessly for long, you always end up at the Praza do Obrodorio, the vast central square at the centre of the city.

There, outside Santiago de Compostela's eighteenth-century cathedral, we met Jorge, a beautifully turned out middle-aged Galician selling tapes and CDs recorded by his band of troubadours. He swept his sloppy black hat from his head in salute and gathered about him an enormous black cape festooned with multi-coloured ribbons - this was clearly the sort of living tourist attraction that could easily get on your nerves.

But Jorge knew exactly what he was doing. Polite, with perfect English, he explained that he and his fellow musicians came from a tradition stretching back to medieval times. They played at weddings and civic occasions and to tourists of course, but mainly for the love of the troubadour's art. Most were students earning a little on the side although he himself was a pharmacist.

'A pharmacist,' I said. 'How very interesting. But where is your band of musicians now and how do you expect me to buy your tapes if I don't know what they sound like?'

Slightly affronted, Jorge reached deep into the folds of his cape and pulled out an ageing cassette recorder and inserted a tape. It was pleasant enough - Spanish guitars with Celtic and Arabic overtones - if you can imagine that - and a quite pleasant tenor lead. It was clearly aimed at the tourist market, but not bad all the same.

I have never encountered such a respectful sales pitch and it set the tone for the whole stay in Santiago. 'By the way Jorge, what does the title of the cassette mean,' I said as he swept away.

'Songs of the Pharmacist,' he said. I knew I was going to like this place.

The Praza do Obradoiro is dominated by the vast cathedral dedicted to St James the Greater, the disciple whose remains were thought to have been discovered in Galicia in the ninth century.

The story of James's reputed links with northern Spain are central to everything that goes on at Santiago. On the death of Jesus, the disciples are said to have wandered the world spreading his teachings and St James chose Spain for his ministry. On his return to Jerusalem, James was beheaded by the authorities, but his followers managed to seize his body and smuggle it back to Spain. Landing in Galicia, near the modern village of Padron, they carried the saint by cart inland and buried him just outside Santiago. In the ninth century, his tomb was found by the hermit Pelagius after he was directed to it by lights in the sky. Santiago sprung up to service the pilgrims

The cathedral itself is dominated by a giant thirteenth-century effigy of the saint embellished with gold and dressed as a pilgrim. In a slightly ghoulish practice devotees can queue to to pass behind the statue and poke their fingers through the golden casing of the statue and touch the wood below. The Spaniards are proud of St James, especially because he later miraculously returned to help them drive out the Muslim occupying forces. He thus earned himself the name 'James the Moor-Slayer' and throughout Santiago, including the cathedral, there are gruesome images of St James as a soldier of Christ wielding a bloody sword with the dusky heads of Muslims strewn at his feet.

Ferdinand and Isabella, the Spanish monarchs who finally drove the Moors from the Iberian peninsula, built the other great building on the Praza do Obradoiro. Since 1953, the Hotel Reis Catolicos has been a Parador, one of a chain of sumptuous state-run hotels. This is fitting for a building that was set up in the late fifteenth century as a hostel to welcome the pilgrims as they arrived in the town. Built around a series of interconnected courtyards, this has to be one of the most beautiful hotels in the world. After wandering in one evening for a drink at the bar, we decided to spend as much time here as possible. The restaurant is superb and if, just once in your life you have the chance to stay here , you must take it.

Indeed the food in Santiago was universally good. In the tiny roads leading to the cathedral, the bars serve great tapas and the local speciality of octopus, fresh from the Atlantic. There is also a very lively market (Mercado de Abastos) a little off the tourist beat in the east of the city where you can pick up local meats and the large breast-shaped cheeses that are the speciality of the region.

Unlike Lourdes, or Mont St Michel, Bethlehem or even the Vatican itself, Santiago has managed to avoid the worst excesses of the kitsch to which only the truly devout seem to be able to attain. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of tourist shops selling little plaster models of becloaked pilgrims bearing the trademark woodenstaff and I'm told that in the summer at the height of the pilgrimage period, the crowds can become unbearable. Maybe it's because of the presence of an ancient university or maybe because Galicia is still fairly isolated from the rest of Europe, but there is an air of contemplation and retreat that affected even this staunchly secular soul.

Martin Bright was a guest of Travelscene (020 8427 8800). He flew with Iberia from London Heathrow to Santiago de Compostela and stayed at the five-star Hotel Sol Melia Araguaney. Two nights cost £455 per person (three nights are £527) including B&B accommodation and schedule flights.