For more than 1,000 years, Catholics have made the pilgrimage to this holy city in northern Spain to visit the shrine of St. James the Great, now the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. This year is the perfect time to join them: according to an ancient papal edict, if you pass through the cathedral’s holy door in a year when the feast of St. James falls on a Sunday (as it does on July 25), you will be forgiven all your sins. The basilica is newly spruced up—its ornate baroque facade unobscured by renovation works for the first time in eight years. Hungry pilgrims can also enjoy the finest bacalao in Spain at Solleiros at the nearby Praza de Mazarelos. Last year, the restaurant’s traditional recipe for salted cod beat 230 others to be named the best in the country. —Dan Stewart