Well ‘ jel’ of Mel’s romantic punt

IDON’T care who knows it, I love Melanie Sykes. That woman has done more to keep my pecker up than Netflix, Mother Nature and my other half put together. At the age of 50 – and it can’t hurt that she’s a breathtaking beauty who looks not a day older than 35 – Mel has simply wafted off to Venice and been swept off her feet by a snog- worthy gondolier.

For heaven’s sake, Melanie Sykes is a walking Mills & Boon novel, a fantasy made flesh, a glorious romantic and escapist vision turned into reality.

From the now somewhat tedious confines of Feltz Towers, I relished every snap of our Mel doing the tourist thing on Saturday and shelling out a shed- load of euros for a clichéd watery voyage through the pungent Venetian canals.

She speedily clocked the sexy gondolier responsible for propelling her through the murky waters because by Monday they were playing tonsil tennis in the cobbled streets – and by Tuesday the pair had clearly shared more than just one Cornetto or a pint of Boddingtons.

BY WEDNESDAY the smitten gondolier had taken a busman’s holiday and was nipping on and off the Venetian vaporetti – or waterbuses – with his arm tightly around Mel’s lissom waist. By Thursday Mel had said “Ciao!” and nipped back to Blighty.

Of course, I’m thrilled for my Radio 2 colleague. I’m delighted that she found succour, solace and more than spaghetti carbonara to warm her cockles. I confess to being just a tad “jel” as well. Who wouldn’t relish a plunge into the passionate embrace of a finely muscled charmer 27 years one’s junior?

More than anything, though, I am sustained by the simple fact that in these testing, trying and restrictive times it is still possible to be spontaneous, give vent to a few primal urges, be caught up in the moment and make an incendiary connection with a fellow human who quite literally floats your boat.

Mel is free as a bird to alight upon excitement wherever she finds it. She has declared a penchant for younger chaps who she says have “a bit more about them”.

If she never lays eyes upon 23- year- old Riccardo Simionato again, they’ll always have Venice and thanks to them, vicariously so will we.