A respected travel and hospitality expert and author, Robert Allegrini now takes on a one-of-a-kind role as honorary consul for the republic of San Marino. When Michigan Stadium is sold out for a Wolverines football game, it fits three times as many people as live in all of San Marino — a nation within Italy that’s so small, it’s referred to in geographic terms as a “microstate.”

Its 33,000 residents, spread out over 24 square miles, occupy the fifth smallest country in the world. It also stands alone as a priceless curiosity, with a style of government and copious architectural gems largely unchanged since the Renaissance.