Dear Roma,
I just returned home after spending 5 days in your company and I wanted to write and tell you how I feel.

Although we were together for such a short time, I felt like I got to know you very well. In fact, and I don’t mind admitting this, I think I have fallen for you in a big way.

And before you say it was just a holiday romance and I’m seeing everything through Rome-tinted glasses, believe me it’s more than that.

The simple truth is, Roma, I am a little in love with you and I can’t stop telling my friends about you.

You’re beautiful Roma, really beautiful. I know you have probably heard that one million times before but it’s true. You’ve got so many attractive features I just couldn’t even begin to list them all.

But if I had to start somewhere I would highlight your most famous feature, the Vatican. Millions of people from all over the world come here every year and you mesmerise them all with your timeless treasures.

Saint Peter’s Basilica was enough for me. I have gazed upon many church interiors in my time, but never have I witnessed beauty on such grand a scale. I am told Michelangelo designed the massive Dome, which is almost as impressive as the Sistine Chapel next door.

And if the genius Michelangelo hadn’t enough to be doing painting and decorating ceilings, he also found time to create another masterpiece, the Pieta, his sculptured study of the Virgin Mary and Jesus, which is on view behind glass in the Basilica. And to think Roma, you let people see all this for free. How kind and generous you are.

I was also hugely taken with your ancient temple of Pantheon, 2,000 years old with 20 foot thick walls and almost perfectly preserved inside. Aside from the extraordinary variety of marble in the Pantheon, what makes this temple such a pleasure is the Dome, (What is it about you and Domes, Rome?)which is the largest of its kind in Europe.

Gaze upon its glory and you are literally looking at the heavens, for the Emperor Hadrian, who designed the temple in 118-125AD left the top of the Dome open for the sun and the showers to pour in on the exquisite marble floor. What a surreal sight it must be to stand inside the Pantheon and have Roman raindrops fall down on your head.

Your beauty, Roma, can also be savage. The Colosseum, crumbling and incomplete, is still a magnificent structure but one shudders to think what those poor creatures, the Christians suffered inside this arena at the hands of merciless lions and the even more merciless Emperors.

History greets you at every turn in Rome. It would take a week of solid sight-seeing to discover the best jewels in your crown, but if you want a more relaxing view of Rome, just go for a ramble and you’ll soon discover some cobblestone streets leading onto an open piazza or square.

It is in such piazzas, surrounded by terracotta-coloured buildings and shuttered windows, you can sit down over a cappuccino or ice cream and watch Rome and the world go by. And in a place like this, I think I gave my heart to you.

So now you know my feelings for you Roma, I’ll sign off and say no more. I threw my coin in the Trevi fountain and made a wish to return.

‘Til we meet again, so long and thanks for a great time.

Brian XXX