Night location: Lecce, Italy It seems as though every street corner in Lecce is adorned with a flamboyant church facade. Between the seventeenth and the eighteenth century artists flocked to the town and created their own 'decorative baroque' style known as Lecce Baroque that is characterised by a sensory overload of friezes, flowers, fruits, spiral columns and wreaths. Our Halliday Sacred Tour started in the Piazza del Duomo with a visit to the Seminary Palace...

Night location: Lecce, Italy This morning we rose early in order to catch the fast train south to the heel of the boot. The five hour journey covered a diverse range of landscapes: well populated hilltop towns that overlooked lush valleys cultivated with vineyards and orchards; dry open plains with rolls of hay scattered across the harvested paddocks; and ancient olive groves established beside the glistening blue waters of the Adriatic coast. Lecce is the main...

Night location: Rome, Italy It is little wonder that we return again and again to Rome. We woke to a beautifully blue skied day and after a sumptuous breakfast that was brought to our room on trays, we set off through the quietly cool streets to Vitti for a coffee. Since 2011, every visit to Rome has included at least one stop at this cafe. Founded in 1898 and set in a bustling piazza with delicious Sicilian cannoli, Vitti is well worth the tourismo sit down cof...

Night location: Rome, Italy After a 31 hour door to door transit, we have made it to the eternal city. Rome has become an integral part of our European holidays so it is lovely to land somewhere reasonably familiar. Our apartment is very close to the top of the Spanish Steps so after a quick change of clothes we navigated our way past the rose touting, glow in the dark toy throwing hustlers to L’Antica Enoteca for dinner. A caprese salad, eggplant parmigiana...