I was about to turn 40 and looking for somewhere to hide out with my partner until it was all over. Rome was the perfect destination: cheap tickets were available online, the city would provide a suitably epic backdrop for a big occasion and surprisingly, neither of us had ever visited it before.
By the time you get to 40, you pride yourself on having acquired a certain degree of competence. You know how to get results. But minutes after arriving in Rome, it feels as though all those painfully-acquired life skills are starting to slip away. First there's the white-knuckle taxi ride from the airport, which has us scrabbling like infants for our rear seat-belts (they prove to be for show purposes only), then helplessly handing over bundles of lire when the requested price proves to be double the sum on the meter.
Walking turns out to be no less of a problem. Emerging from our hotel - the super-chic new Hotel de Russie, just off the Piazza del Popolo (9 Via del Babuino, tel: 39 06 32 88 81, single rooms from L590,000, doubles from L800,000) - we find ourselves among the promenading hordes. Of course, we've heard about la passeggiata; we just didn't know that in Rome it goes on all day. And a warm Sunday afternoon in autumn gives locals an ideal opportunity to show off their world-beating array of shiny leather suits and snakeskin hipsters. Whether the stiffness of the leather restricts movement, or new outfits have to be run in at low speed, like a new car engine, the shopping streets are virtually impassable, and what looks on the map like a short stroll turns into a Versace-clad obstacle course.
Our next challenge arises when we decide to get some lunch. We want our first Italian meal in Rome to be perfect, and having wandered around the area, we're reassured to see a large number of promising-looking trattorias with pavement tables. But at 2pm, it's as though a lunch bell has sounded, and suddenly every restaurant has a queue outside, right down to the humblest pizza chain. We beat a retreat to a cavernous pizzeria. Forty minutes later, we're still waiting to be brought so much as a piece of bread. When our pizzas do eventually arrive, though, they're worth the wait - yeasty and crisp-based in the Roman style.
Happily, this first dining experience turns out not to be typical. Despite their reputation, Romans aren't unfriendly to tourists. We just don't seem to register with them. Which is great, if you hate being hassled by people trying to sell you things. The centurions posing for photos outside the Colosseum are as near as Rome comes to pandering to the tourist trade.
After our lunch experience, we are even more determined to find the perfect, mythical trattoria. Our pre-dinner stroll takes in the huge monument to King Vittorio Emanuele II, inaugurated in 1911 to celebrate the unification of the nation but often dismissively referred to as "the wedding cake". Then on to the Spanish Steps, where the mating call of hundreds of suburban adolescents rises on the evening breeze.
Next, the Trevi fountain, immortalised in La Dolce Vita. We are overwhelmed by the size and swagger of the rococo marble confection, with its underwater carpet of glinting coins. I'm only left standing alone for a moment, gazing into the fountain's depths, when a soulful young man sidles up to me, and asks whether I speak Italian. Had I indeed been able to speak Italian, I could have snapped "What are you playing at? I'm going to be 40 tomorrow!" As it is, I flash him my biggest Anita Ekberg smile while backing away. Oh well, when in Rome...
Around the corner from the Parliament building, we stumble across what looks like our ideal, untouristy little trattoria. At first, it seems perfect. It obviously hasn't been decorated since Mussolini's day, and its handful of tables are filled with laughing groups of students and other bohemian types. There's no written menu - a shy waitress recites the evening's choices - three pastas and two meat dishes. It's only after we've ordered that we notice the state of the kitchen and, even more alarming, the state of its only occupant, a mountainous, be-slippered female straight from the kitchen of Castle Gormenghast.
Perfectly good though our spinach and ricotta ravioli turns out to be, this place falls just on the wrong side of authentic. We resolve to do some research and book somewhere really good for tomorrow night's birthday dinner.
How can we go wrong with Il Convivio (31,Vicolo dei Soldati, tel:06 686 9432)? It's listed in the "splashing out" section of our guidebook as "a temple of foodie excellence". And temple is just about right. From its forbidding wooden door and whispering waiters, to the reverential near-silence of its clientele, this is a place of worship rather than enjoyment. The food is predictably fantastic, in the teased-up, whittled-down style peculiar to Michelin-starred restaurants. But the best dish is the simplest: a heap of fresh, buttery tagliatelle, over which our waiter grates white truffle until I tell him to stop - rather a hair-raising judgment call, as I've been given a menu with no prices on it. In the end, our meal comes to around £100, which is less than we'd feared.
On the last full day of our Roman holiday, we abandon any pretence of sightseeing, and concentrate on finding our dream restaurant. The breakthrough comes with our discovery of the Bar Notegen (159 Via del Babuino tel: 06 320 0855). Seemingly unchanged since the 1950s, it's a snug, wood-panelled room lined with old black-and-white photos of Italian actors and artists. This feels very much like Fellini country - the director lived nearby - and some of the characters who hang around the Notegen still seem to be auditioning for a part in one of his movies.
That evening, just around the corner from the Notegen - and our hotel - we finally find our perfect vision of a Roman trattoria. The Edy (4 Vicolo del Babuino, tel: 06 36 00 17 38) has everything - a glowing, candle-lit interior, warm and welcoming staff, a chef who pops out from the kitchen to see how his dishes are going down, cooed-over infants in high chairs munching on breadsticks. And most importantly, really great cooking. Seafood spaghetti is baked in a foil parcel, which is brought to the table to spill its aromatic contents. Bean and pasta soup is thick enough to stand a spoon in. Grilled lamb cutlets bring out the Ancient Roman in me, and I'm soon attacking them with both hands.
No doubt there are hundreds of restaurants in Rome as unpretentious, friendly and atmospheric as the Edy. But we didn't have the time to find them all.
However, during our brief stay we managed to take in a fair number of Rome's most famous sights. Inevitably, though, things got left off the list. We didn't make it to the Sistine Chapel, or inside Saint Peter's. Instead, we opted to avoid the crowds of pilgrims by walking around the Vatican City late at night. This turned out to be a good move - we found ourselves alone in the square in front of the magnificently-spotlit cathedral as its bells tolled midnight, the only spectators at a spooky son et lumière.
The practicals
British Airways Holidays (0870 24 24 243, www.britishairways.com/ holiday/holiday.shtml), Citalia (020-8686 0677, www.citalia.co.uk), Italian Journeys (020-7373 8058), Thomson Breakaway (0870 606 1476), Travelscene (0870 777 4445, www.travelscene.co.uk), and the Magic of Italy (08700 270 500, www.magictravelgroup.co.uk) are some of the companies that offer packages to Rome. Go (0870 6076543, www.go-fly.com) has flights from £80 return.
