Blogs from Valletta, Malta, Malta, Europe - page 3

Malta in December. This would be our version of warm weather training! As a change to freezing ourselves somewhere in Eastern Europe, a few days on a sunny Mediterranean island would be just the order of the day. There would be no significant language barrier, no chance of a game being off due to weather and presumably no complicated membership scheme to hinder our route to a ticket. The previous month in Poland had dimmed our enthusiasm for another cold weather excursion. At half the price of the intended destination in Bulgaria, the Man in the Middle instantly gave the wildcard choice a big fat “yes” even though it meant he had to sacrifice a night of sleep to get down to Gatwick Airport. The level of shut eye was further diminished by a far too ... read more

Hello my fellow travellers! Okay, I have to admit that our itinerary didn't end up exactly like the one we had yesterday. We started this day with a steady continental breakfast at the hotel before we hopped on a bus to Valletta, this time however we got off at the Bombes Gate instead, it's a pretty nice ornamental gate in the old Florian defensive line and it's worth a closer look. From there we went and took a look at the small Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Church and the Spencer Monument that both stand a little further down by the road. Our path next took us by the Lion Fountain and the statue of Florian to the stunning Saint Publius's Church, which was unfortunately closed so we'll come back another day. Oh, if you're ... read more

Our 6th day was an "at sea" day...good for sleeping in, lounging around, meeting people, visiting the casino, watching the shows. Our 7th day would be Malta. We had very limited knowledge of Malta before arriving. We knew that it is a very small island country situated west of Tunisia (Africa), north of Libya, and south of Sicily. I knew that it had been an important naval station during the world wars, and that it contained several world heritage sites. Upon arriving, we noticed just how fortified the city was. There were steep, tall, deep walls all around the harbor. The city looked very well taken care of also. This was one of the few stops we hadn't planned an organized excursion, so we walked around the port for a while, and bought tickets to one ... read more

So I'm in Malta. We left Tuesday afternoon and arrived at the hotel in Bugibba at midnight. I had a fun day of riding my cousin Harry's trunki around Norwich airport, running around with a little girl I met there - she's my age and flying in a plane! I really liked looking out the window at all the clouds on this flight and the nice people at Thomas Cook even gave me a seat of my own :-) I wasn't so keen on the takeoff though, it was just SO noisy! Yesterday I spent the day playing in the hotel pools and the little play area. There is a big slide I like in there plus a castle playhouse. My cousin Evie would love it, it's a big castle and it's purple. Mummy and daddy ... read more

Day two started off on the later side, with a housekeeper knocking on my door and waking me up around 11:30am – oopsie! I wasn’t feeling too hot, but Malta’s most impressive church, St. John’s co-cathedral, was only open until 12:30 so I had to book it if I wanted to be able to see that. Luckily it was only a couple blocks from my hotel. Built between 1573 and 1578, the church has equal status to St. Paul’s Cathedral in Mdina, hence the term “co-cathedral”. It was constructed as the conventual church of the Knights of St. John, and despite its rather plain façade the interior is spectacular. The blue walls studded with Maltese crosses were for some reason the most beautiful part to me, but opulence was everywhere. The floor was a patchwork ... read more