Rome meetup.

My solo time is about to come to and end. I'm meeting the partner in Rome tomorrow. I take the bus to Venice and then meet a lovely lady on the train. She tells me her family has a house in Auronzo! And when I show her a photo of my late husband, she remembers seeing him about town! She's 79, never had children, her husband passed away a couple of years ago and her dog not so long ago. She has set up a Tent group for immigrant women in Mestre, just outside Venice, to exchange cultural activities: poetry, food, playgroups for the children. The women are isolated as their husbands work so this group was set up to bring Italian and immigrant women together.

We exchange numbers as we arrive in Rome to 36 degree heat. There's a huge line up for taxis and in front of me, I am impressed with an older Italian man in an ochre yellow linen suit with a perfectly pressed handkerchief in his pocket and polished brown loafers looking cool and calm. How do Italians look so suave with so much ease?

My hotel is near Piazza Navona in a lovely old building not far from the river, a part of town I haven't stayed in before, Antica Dimora Delle Cinque Lune. I dine that night with my husband's family near the Colosseum, every one asking questions and then talking over me when I try to answer. My soft English voice doesn't work in this Italianesque situation.

There's a knock on my door and the partner has arrived after a four months absence. He looks with amusement at the gothic style Italianate room I've booked. Aubergine textured wallpaper, pewter trims, glamorous padded bedhead and ancestral portraits on the wall. We breakfast on the rooftop with a view of Rome's rusty clay coloured tiled roofs, with huge gulls squawking on the balcony walls. The buffet breakfast brings to mind ancient Roman feasts where you needed to lie down afterwards. Arancini, fried and crunchy prosciutto, light as air tiny croissants, tiny round donuts, beautiful breads, homemade tarts with fruit.

the partner is too excited to sleep so we go on a tour of the Domitian stadium that lies underneath Piazza Navona, dating back to 80 AD and which could seat up to 30000 people for athletic events. Then we wander to the markets where we're given free samples of every type of liquor you could imagine; peach, pistachio, orange, watermelon, blood orange. We buy the classic Limoncello, get told off for touching the tomatoes by an old feisty Italian woman and buy truffle salami in a shop that has been selling pork products for 90 years. Things I wouldn't have bought on my own.

We lunch in the beautiful square, fans spraying out a fine mist to keep us cool. We have fritto misto of tiny fish, calamari, prawns and squid in a cone of brown paper with a chilli sauce and buffalo ricotta fried in breadcrumbs and drizzled with honey. We watch the Roman men and women with their little dogs, their baskets and their haggling over all the wonderful produce in this open air market.

The partner has a jetlagged nap and then we head out into the cooler air of early evening for aperitivi. I have a limoncello spritz, which redefines the Aperol one for a hot summer's evening. We're presented with an array of tiny aperitivi, beautifully displayed at no extra cost. The partner is amazed.

Then we wander the cobbled streets until we find an old trattoria. The food is rustic and amazing. Artichoke pasta, pumpkin flowers stuffed with mozzarella and anchovies, chicory with garlic and chilli and the host's brother-in-law's homegrown olive oil, pungent and deep green. Rome never fails to impress.