It's sadly our last full day in Malta today, as we're flying back at 12.30pm tomorrow, so that will not leave any time for us to do anything other than get to the airport. My wife wanted to relax by the pool today. I wanted to go to Marsaxlokk, which is a small fishing village that I had read about. I caught a bus and was there in about half an hour, most of which was spent with the bus fighting its way through narrow streets again. I feel sorry for the bus drivers here, as the cars, both those parked and the ones driving don’t make it any easier. And that reminds me, one thing I don't like about the Maltese is their manners. I'm going to stop standing to one side to wait for ... read more

After our rebellion at the hotel yesterday (see ), we had cancelled the remainder of the nights in St. Paul's Bay and had booked to go back to Valletta. It was a bit sad and the hotel manager genuinely wanted to know why. Apart from Las Vegas, where we really despised both the hotel and the whole city (see ), we've never checked out of a hotel early before. On that occasion, we left Vegas and went on to Death Valley (see ). There's a lot on the UK news at the moment about the current heat wave hitting both the Southern United States and Southern Europe, the latter of which we're experiencing first hand at the moment, Death Valley is in the middle of record temperatures of well over 50°C. It was a mild 43 ... read more

It was to be another exciting adventure on the buses today, this time a lot further away, so the two Euros each will be even better value. We were heading for Mdina, which is close to the centre of Malta. After an hour deciphering the Malta bus routes (slight exaggeration) we worked out that any of routes 50, 51, 52, 53 or 56 would get us there and they left from a whole another set of bus stops round the corner from the main area. We went round there and waited for which ever route arrived first. It was a 52. Whilst Valletta itself is quite small and compact, the built-up, urban sprawl that surrounds it is surprisingly large. At a guess I'd say it almost covers a quarter of the island. The only slight downside ... read more

There's still lots left to see in Valletta, but we decided that we would go on a little adventure today and get the boat over to Sliema. We eventually managed to work out where the ferry left from and how to get there, as there was little in the way of signs. There's a road that goes off in the wrong direction, but then loops back through a tunnel under the main road. The boat leaves every 30 minutes on the hour and the half hour, and was bang on time (maybe the influences from nearby Italy are not as strong as we thought they are - see ). We decided to brave the sun and sit on the top deck, where we got some excellent views back towards Valletta. And forward towards Sliema for that ... read more

It's the first day of our holiday, but most of it is actually being spent at home as the flight was not until 4.35 in the afternoon. At least that means that we're not dragging ourselves out of bed at the crack of dawn for a mad dash to the airport with the prospect of rush hour on the M25. We could have a leisurely morning packing (we're very last minute with our packing to put it mildly) and then leave plenty of time to drive to Gatwick without worrying about the inevitable jams. We had booked the valet parking, as it was only marginally more expensive than the long-stay and meant that there was no need to hunt for spaces in a mammoth mass of cars and then wait to catch a bus to the ... read more