Beautiful beaches, fantastic seafood, fascinating history... Galicia has them all. So why do so few Brits head to the idyllic North-West corner of Spain, wonders John Kerswill

North by North West

"It's cold and wet up there, isn't it?" said an acquaintance when I mentioned I was off to Galicia for an early summer holiday.

Well, compared with the searing summer heat of Spain's interior, perhaps. But by British standards, the weather in north-west Spain looks good. Think Cornwall plus about five degrees and a couple of hours' more sunshine.

There are other similarities with the West Country. Like Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor, the Galician hills are made of granite, supporting heather, gorse and wild ponies.

The granite accounts for the wonderful smooth, pale sand on the shores of the rias – long, drowned river valleys, rather like Cornwall's Fal estuary.

Plenty of near-deserted beaches to choose from

'We tried at least a dozen more beaches, all beautiful, clean and – except on Sunday – virtually deserted'

And, as on the Celtic fringes of northern Europe, there is a feeling of being out on a limb, facing out to sea with your back to the rest of the country. Galicia has Europe's biggest fishing fleets. For centuries it provided most of the emigrants from Spain to South America. Lately, thousands have returned, helping to make this the most densely populated province of Spain.

Galicia is hugely popular with Spanish tourists in July and August, with only a sprinkling of independent-minded travellers from elsewhere. The mass international tourism of the last century simply passed the area by. City breaks in Santiago de Compostela are as mainstream as it gets.

But missing out on the 1970s package holiday boom now looks like a blessing. For DIY holidaymakers who book their own no-frills flight, self-booked accommodation and a hire car, the absence of over-development is not just an attraction, it's essential for a good holiday.