To reach Andorra you'll have to drive. Not a great prospect, but the only sensible option. Andorra is high, a small principality lodged in the folds of some of Europe's highest peaks, along the zig-zagged, saw-toothed Pyrenean borders of France and Spain where the air grows thin, like a motorist's patience - unless you're a saint. Praying may also come in handy.
The sky in the Languedoc, on the edge of the French Pyrenees, where I'd been staying, was promising sunshine all the way as I set off. Lured by mountains in glowing light, I was counting villages, gazing at fields of corn and wheat, at the distant, even higher hilltops, picturesquely splashed by mist; not paying attention to the warnings.
There were others heading there too - in trucks, HGVs, plus an endless stream of lumbering, carbon-belching petrol-tankers weighed down by one of Andorra's most famous bargains: dirt-cheap petrol. The road rose steadily towards the pleated folds of mountains, traffic thickened, became a caterpillar of sluggishness as the gradient lifted and mist began to swirl. Trapped in grey fug, the wipers tearing at the windscreen, I was beset by questions: would I reach there? And where was I now? Like a B-movie answer, shafts of light poked through the mist and there, above me, like God's big eye, the sun was lighting an alpine vista of flowers and trees. The sound of money was not far away.
`CONGRATULATIONS on reaching Andorra", read the border sign. Or it should have. Pas de la Casa, on the frontier, is marked on the map as a town with a customs post. Call it Spendsville. Here, hundreds of cars pull in and park, while their occupants raid the clutch of hypermarkets offering tax-free shopping. The raiders then scarper back to France. I tanked up with petrol, which at 39 pence a litre, filled the car for £17. Pas de la Casa is a watering hole. I was travelling beyond it, to Andorra La Vella, the country's capital, lodged in a glorious mountain valley. Bargain City.
"The prices in Andorra are very special," my tourist board booklet said, with untypical restraint. "[Here] you have the most glorious opportunity to remember those you love." In La Vella there's little else to do as you wander the streets, picturing loved ones draped in jewellery you've bestowed on them, smoking tax-free fat Havanas, strolling along like Mafiosi behind the black stare of their Gucci shades. Yes, ogle gifts, and spend in spades to your heart's content. But first, you must drive along the shopping street from Hell - Avigunda Maritxell, a concrete wasteland that seems unending.
Traffic speeds through it, ushered by traffic cops who have taken vows of menace. You hurtle past the Quero Bar and Yeti Sports, cameras, perfume bottles and gold, twinkling back at you in a blur from behind the crowds of voracious shoppers who hog the footpaths, greedy for deals, spoilt for choice.
The population of Andorra is 65,000, sprinkled and rumpled across 190 square miles. Most live inside La Vella. In summer, they are joined by a flood of tourists, brimming over from street to shop, carrying off prized flotsam and jetsam. At this time of year the whole of the principality is a ski resort. This is a country of extremes. Most people are here to hit and run, staying one night. Others come simply for the day. They miss the magnificence of the landscape, the breathtaking villages, Romanesque churches that teeter on hillsides, the layers of life.
Close to the city's heart, where the thrum of Avenue Meritxell bleeds away into passing tranquillity, I ate lunch at the restaurant Dos Cacadors in pretty Placa Rebes, staring over shuttered windows, and flower-box petunias, to alpine roof tops, and higher still to the sheer recalcitrant magnificence of the mountains - Pic de Carroi, Monteixo, and Pic d'Enclar - stretching close to 10,000 feet, as if I had driven all the way up the twisting stem of a marvellous flower to sit in its petal-cup, catching the sun, surrounded by wonders.
My waiter was typical of Andorrans: reserved, efficient. A sinuous mover, equine-faced, he was stylishly slo-mo, a bit like the food, the paella particularly dry and disappointing. As I watched him, I was ambushed by thoughts of Come Dancing. He had a smoky, indoors, after-hours kind of Pasa Doble suggestiveness that made me long to escape.
Resisting the shops, I turned my attention to the past. It is just a step away, cheek-by-jowl with the busy restaurants, tucked away in the narrow, paved alleyways, drenched in shadow, replete with fountains and metal sculptures, behind the modest 12th-century church of St Esteve. The hush inside the church is vast. A thunderous silence to cancel the murmur from the wheeler-dealing distance. Hemming it in, breathing over it, are streets in which crafts are practised to this day. They smell of medieval intimacy, suggesting a closeness and clamour long since gone. Andorra has for centuries, under treaty between France and Spain, maintained a buffer-state independence, having its own language, culture, and tax laws. Not until 1993 did it acquire full independence: its people are fiercely proud of their roots, touting the legend that their state was founded by Charlemagne, in 784 AD .
I hit the shops. I was after a camera, but none of the places I found had prices attached to the merchandise. I speak Catalan like a native of Belfast - and English was rarer than sightings of Yeti. I kicked my heels around the dog-leg of Avigunda Meritxell, aghast at the cheapness, gawking at Monte Cristo Minis, Carino, and Vasco da Gama cigars - enough to drive you to the weed after life-long abstinence, just as the petrol price made me want to spin round the mountains, guzzling gas.
In a bargain emporium called REBIXS, I found myself trapped. The store - all five floors of it - was congested. Where were the exits? Was the reason for the congestion the fact that no one was getting out? Like Vegas casinos, REBIXS doesn't encourage deserters. If you plan to get home, bring a ball of string. I bumped into Theseus in the restaurant, looking ancient, trapped with the Minotaur, still a touch bullish but smothered with bargains like an obscenely tousled Christmas tree. Theseus wept. The hallucinogenic effect of REBIXS can't be dismissed. But the perfect antidote is fresh air.
Andorran air has world-class freshness in every ion. If the breeze you feel in Avigunda Meritxell is an overdraft your pockets, the waft of warm winds in the mountain-passes, on rippled streams criss-crossing hillsides, dotted with irises, marjoram, thyme, is a soothing refreshment. I felt their balm as I drove towards the border.
At 5 p.m. I hit the tail-back. Then the mist blew in. Hearing cow-bells, I saw no cows, could barely see the car in front. Claustrophobia struck the line. People, shivering, were suddenly disgorging into the damp pervading chill, car doors banging in the distance.
The hold-up was due to Andorran efficiency, funnelling cars from Pas de la Casa, laden with booty, into the line. Two hours and 20 minutes later I passed the customs post. No check. But inside France, near Bourg Madame, I was stopped by gendarmes. "Open the boot!" They didn't frisk me - for which I was grateful. All I remember now is the look of profound disbelief on the policeman's face. No booze, no ciggies, no tax-free loot. Their absence provoked his amazement. Well that, or maybe - an outside bet - the sight of Theseus, plus some impudent, eyelash fluttering, irresistible, stowaway bull.