Write about what you [don't] know....

This is a piece I once wrote for a guidebook-writing competition.  I was hampered only by the fact that I had never been to Andorra. So being a medievalist with a taste for Dornford Yates, I stuck largely to what I did know. *I came second.

Dornford Yates once wrote a fantasy novel about a fairytale land that was somehow overlooked when the border between France and Spain was drawn; a magical place where anything could happen.  Andorra, a tiny, landlocked principality of some 468km² in the eastern Pyrenees, may not be the Etchechuria of The Stolen March, but has some similarities. Part of its appeal lies in the novelty of visiting a country that in some ways is scarcely a country at all, lacking its own language and army. Until the advent of the euro it was unusual in not having its own currency, accepting both Spanish pesetas and French francs.

Andorra’s relatively inaccessible location protected it from the mainstream of European events for most of the last thousand years. In the late 8th and early 9th centuries, however, the Pyrenees were in the front line of the struggle between Latin Christendom and the expansion of the Muslim Moors. According to tradition, Charlemagne granted a charter of liberties to Andorra’s inhabitants, but the earliest known document relating to Andorra is the grant in 843 by his grandson, Charles the Bald, of the valleys of Andorra to the Count of Urgell.  In the 13th century a dispute between the Spanish Bishop of Urgell and the French Count of Foix was resolved by a joint sovereignty agreement which has lasted to the present day. Andorra remained largely remote from international politics. As befits a country nominally ruled jointly by a Spanish bishop and the French head of state, Andorra remained neutral during both World Wars; though smuggling through its mountain passes proved lucrative. 

These days smuggling has been replaced by the more legitimate activity of tax free shopping; a major draw for the nine million or so visitors who outnumber Andorra’s 70,000 inhabitants each year.  The other big attraction is winter sports, heavy snowfalls and mountainous terrain providing excellent conditions for six months of the year. Sadly, most tourists completely miss the quieter, more rural Andorra.  The terrain is rugged, and the stone buildings and Romanesque churches may lack the chocolate-box appeal of Alpine views, but the rural areas provide excellent walking country and many towns and villages hold lively festivals during the summer months.