Just 30 miles east of the start of stage three of the Tour de France is the town of Azpeitia. It looks similar to anywhere else in the hills of the Basque Country, surrounded by green vertiginous slopes, with small apartment blocks and lots of red, white and green flags.
However, unlike Durango, or Eibar, or Amorebieta-Etxano, where the stage began, Azpeitia was the birthplace of a saint. Not just any saint, either, but Ignacio de Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits, and one of the key architects of the counter-reformation.
