Ay, Guadalupe!

...you'll be taken to a side chapel filled with shelf after shelf of relics - carved thigh bones, fingers in silver, vials of dried blood - dusty fragments of eternity preserved for the veneration of the faithful. Relics are out of fashion these days, but this collection of medieval piety is fascinating

The Virgin of Guadalupe

If you've visited Avila, city of Saint Teresa and Saint John of the Cross, there's another place here in the Castilian heartland you should see. Your pilgrimage will take you through the royal city of Toledo and south into the Sierra de Guadalupe. When I came this way, I passed pine-clad slopes and bare granite ridges, gullies filled with yellow bracken and squawking wild birds, hills nurtured with olive and vine and, everywhere, the wild rose-like jara, which perfumes the air in this part of the country. I stopped to ask directions. The toothless old goatherd pointed the way, with a grin. "Ay, Guadalupe! " he cackled, accompanied by the clink-clonk of goat bells. "La alma de españa!" The soul of Spain. I drove on through the gathering dusk and it was dark when twinkling lights on the horizon announced Guadalupe.

I first made my way to the parador. Of all Spain's paradores - those inns originally created by the government but now in private hands - this one in Guadalupe is my favourite. My high-ceilinged bedroom was whitewashed, with wooden shutters and a madonna in mosaic on one wall. The window opened onto an olive grove, backed by a distant ridge of purple mountains. I walked down a sweeping staircase to a central courtyard, filled with orange and lemon trees. A tiled, cloister-like walkway led me to a lantern-lit dining room where delicious regional specialties (garlic soup, roast kid) were served. Guadalupe, 300 km from Madrid, is not on every visitor's itinerary, but if you have a sense of history and a pilgrim's soul, you should not miss it. This tiny mountain village is a spiritual centre revered here like no other, save Santiago de Compostela, in the north. This is conquistador country and Guadalupe, with its historic Virgin, is its spiritual capital, a charismatic link between the old Spain and the new. Here, in Guadalupe, the charter authorizing the expedition which discovered America was signed, here were baptized the first American Indians converted to Christianity. Columbus named an island in the West Indies after the Virgin of Guadalupe and she became, through the Spanish colonizers, the Patroness of Latin America, giving her name to countless little girls from Argentina to Peru. The hispanidad - that community of language, civilization and religion - has its heart here, in this isolated village in Spain's central sierra.

Parador, Guadalupe

Before you visit Guadalupe, it's important to know a little about the Virgin and her unique place in Spanish history. The story itself is very Spanish: a figure, carved by St Luke the Apostle, the Virgin Mary herself posing for the sculpture. Transported from Byzantium to Rome. Displayed in a solemn procession by Pope Gregory to help combat the plague. Then disappearing for centuries, apparently lost forever until the 13th century when a goatherd found it at Guadalupe. A small shrine was built upon the spot, which grew in magnificence over the years. Today, Guadalupe is a major place of pilgrimage and the Virgin sits high over the altar of the monastery church in gilded, bejewelled splendour.

You will certainly wish to see the monastery, which is just over the road from the parador. Tours take a little over an hour. The place was built - and added to - from the 14th to the 18th century, so it's a hodgepodge of styles. I was particularly impressed with the embroidery museum in the beautiful Mudejar cloisters. Here you can see ancient vestments and altar frontals including one macabre cope in black, silver and gold, used for funerals in days long past and patterned with grinning skulls. In the Chapterhouse and Sacristy, you'll see illuminated books and an impressive collection of paintings by Zurburan - portraits of priors of the monastery painted in the mid 17th century. And you'll be taken to a side chapel filled with shelf after shelf of relics - carved thigh bones, fingers in silver, vials of dried blood - dusty fragments of eternity preserved for the veneration of the faithful. Relics are out of fashion these days, but this collection of medieval piety is fascinating.

Monastery, Guadalupe

At this point in your tour, your guide changes, from layman to monk, for you are now to be taken high up into the church, to the camarin - the 18th century room where the Virgin sits overlooking the nave. Up the marble steps you'll climb, higher and higher, until you are finally inside the small room. The statue is nowhere to be seen. The monk, savouring the moment, reaches for a gilded, enamelled panel and slowly it swings around, revealing the small figure, carved in wood which the years (and smoke from candles and incense) have stained dark brown, almost black. The Virgin carries in her arms a tiny, darkened Christchild and both figures are robed in stiffened triangular garments of gold, encrusted with jewels. After brief prayers, the monk reaches under the Virgin's gown for a silver medallion on a white ribbon, offering it for you to kiss. It is a strangely affecting scene; even the most cynical observer cannot help but reflect upon the impact of this small wooden figure on world history.

Ay! Guadalupe. This is not the black lace-flamenco-and-roses Spain you're probably more familiar with. But here, in the Land of Stones and Saints, you'll find the true heart of Spain - and an austere, passionate beauty you're not likely to forget.