She hit it off with the guy she met at the bar on vacation. Then he sent her an unexpected text message

When Giuseppe Morisani first suggested it, Skyler Mapes thought she must have misread his message.

When Giuseppe Morisani first suggested it, Skyler Mapes thought she must have misread his message.

She'd met Giuseppe just over a week before, in a bar in Rome. The two strangers connected instantly: an evening drinking and dancing —communicating mostly via Google Translate — culminating in 4 a.m. bowls of pasta pomodoro eaten standing up in Giuseppe's friend's kitchen, gazing at the stars out the window.

This dreamy evening was the start of a whirlwind weekend.

"We spent the next couple of days together," Skyler tells CNN Travel today. "It was just so nice. It was very freeing to be in Rome, to be young…"

Skyler and Giuseppe exchanged numbers, but made no promises to meet again.

And then Giuseppe sent the text Skyler couldn't quite believe:

"I really want to see you," he wrote. "I want you to come to Calabria to meet my mom."