Cheap at twice the price, the world imagines they'll court you and woo you, they'll recite poetry and write painstaking short stories about the wonderment they see in you. Oh and they are a mixture of the edgy non-gorgeous good looks of Patrick Bergin, Liam Neeson and Gabriel Byrne. Or at least they would if Hollywood was in charge of the script and the sets. The fact that proves my point though, is the one that Irish men spend more on flowers than their UK counterparts at this time of year. If you truly have come to Ireland looking for romance it can be found in scenery around you.
Most hotels come with full gyms and swimming pools.
But forget about the Irish for a minute. What about the man himself. Christian martyr and bankroll for Hallmark and chocolate makers everywhere, patron saint of florists and teddy bear manufacturers, I wonder when St Valentine gave his life for the cause he realised quite what a cause it would turn out to be. The ancient Christian Church were none too happy with your pagan gods and goddesses and their habit of distracting good Christian converts. So they took to replacing the major ones with Christian saints.