History is taken seriously in Girona, an ancient city in northeast Catalonia. Catalonia is famous for its modernist artists -- architect Antoni Gaudí, painter Salvador Dali and gastronomic wizard Ferran Adriá -- and the buzz of its capital city, Barcelona. But in Girona, the draw is tradition.

Beginning in the 1980s, the town, led by a historian-turned-mayor,...
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History is taken seriously in Girona, an ancient city in northeast Catalonia. Catalonia is famous for its modernist artists -- architect Antoni Gaudí, painter Salvador Dali and gastronomic wizard Ferran Adriá -- and the buzz of its capital city, Barcelona. But in Girona, the draw is tradition.

Beginning in the 1980s, the town, led by a historian-turned-mayor, rediscovered its ancient Jewish quarter, reconstructed part of the city's medieval ramparts and polished the shopping boulevards of its historic quarter. Pride in the old is so ingrained that when, on my first day of what I had termed my "beyond Barcelona" tour, I asked a local what he thought of El Celler Can Roca, a Michelin-starred destination restaurant that employs avant-garde techniques, he answered: "It's nice. But it's different."Perhaps it's the determined focus on history that makes so many tourists overlook Girona. Serious cyclists pay the city attention: Lance Armstrong made Girona his base while he trained for several Tour de France races. But guidebooks give the city only a cursory nod. Even when discount airline Ryanair announced that it would begin flights to Girona in 2002, most tourists used it as a cheap way to get to Barcelona, about an hour away. For most, it's a day trip -- at best.

But Girona is to Barcelona what Arrezzo is to Florence in Tuscany. It's smaller, quieter and a city that would be a top destination in its own right if it didn't have such a famous neighbor. Day trips don't do it justice, because the best way to appreciate it is slowly: lounging at one of the elegant outdoor cafes, window-shopping at the boutiques housed in historic facades or wandering the circuitous, narrow lanes. There must be almost a dozen ways to wind your way up to the cathedral on the hill, and each one offers a different vantage of the Gothic spires, the Romanesque towers and the stone ramparts that once protected the city.
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