We got a huge surprise on Wednesday that illustrates the old adage “one man’s misery is another man’s delight”. It was the sea day before Malta and at 1PM the Captain’s voice came over the intercom for his mid-day nautical report and told us that because of a medical emergency we would be arriving in Malta at 5:30 that day instead of 8AM the following morning. We heard from acquaintances that a woman had had a stroke and she would have to be admitted to a hospital in Malta. We were all very sorry for her but excited at the thought of an unexpected evening off the ship.
We had been to Malta in 1998 and the main thing we remembered was the sail in. The city is made of golden limestone and when the sun shines on the buildings it looks like solid gold. Sailing in at 5:30 in the evening isn’t quite as spectacular as 5:30AM but it was beautiful nonetheless. Malta has a history that is over 6000 years old. The island has been the cause of wars for thousands of years, including World War II, but gained its independence in the 1960’s. Malta today looks as if it hasn’t changed for many centuries. The fortresses and strongholds used to defend the city so many times still stand today and give the city an enchanting quality. Narrow side streets with hidden staircases make it so much fun to explore the town.
We got our group together and disembarked about 6PM. It’s about a ½ mile walk into the town center where there’s a traffic circle surrounding a large fountain and lined with orange and white city buses, many of them vintage 1940. We walked the streets for an hour or so looking for a restaurant to suit everyone’s taste and finally decided on one that was right across the street from a gorgeous cathedral called St. John’s Co-Cathedral. It’s called a co-cathedral because ordinarily Rome will only allow a city to have one cathedral, but Valletta petitioned the Pope to allow them to have two, so now they have two co-cathedrals, St. John’s and St. Paul’s. We sat outside at umbrella tables and had a mediocre meal but a very good time. Afterwards we walked down to the dock area which is a string of warehouses that have been refurbished and is now a wide boulevard of shops, cafes and restaurants. We met a few other friends and ended the night with a gelato.
The next morning we didn’t have any specific plans. Everyone was going in a different direction so Ed and I were on our own. We decided to get a map of Valletta and walk the perimeter of the city. The weather was clear, mid-70’s. We got our map at the visitor’s center and set out. All the way around the city there is either a bastion or a fort or a defensive wall of some kind. It was a shorter walk than we had anticipated, less than 2 ½ miles. We stopped at a small outdoor café for a cup of coffee and right outside the fence of the café was a walled terrace with 8 cannons pointing out to sea. A ceremony was about to take place which featured shooting a cannon at noon. It happened to be 11:50AM so we were just in time to see and HEAR the cannon being discharged. What a thrill!
When we’d completed the circle we decided to go to the National Library and on our way there we ran into another couple we knew from the ship. They told us they had been to Mdina and it was well worth the trip, a 20-minute bus ride away. They even gave us their daily bus pass to use. So we decided to go after visiting the library.
The Library was interesting but not what I expected. It was a research library where only the most scholarly Maltese hang out. We were given visitor passes and went up to the “reading room”. There were only 3 or 4 people there and the only things we were interested in seeing were the war exhibits and historical information. There were some old books that were so disintegrated that they were being held together by string. We stayed about 10 minutes.
I’m going to write a separate blog on Mdina because it was so fascinating and we can only download 5 pictures.
We had been to Malta in 1998 and the main thing we remembered was the sail in. The city is made of golden limestone and when the sun shines on the buildings it looks like solid gold. Sailing in at 5:30 in the evening isn’t quite as spectacular as 5:30AM but it was beautiful nonetheless. Malta has a history that is over 6000 years old. The island has been the cause of wars for thousands of years, including World War II, but gained its independence in the 1960’s. Malta today looks as if it hasn’t changed for many centuries. The fortresses and strongholds used to defend the city so many times still stand today and give the city an enchanting quality. Narrow side streets with hidden staircases make it so much fun to explore the town.
We got our group together and disembarked about 6PM. It’s about a ½ mile walk into the town center where there’s a traffic circle surrounding a large fountain and lined with orange and white city buses, many of them vintage 1940. We walked the streets for an hour or so looking for a restaurant to suit everyone’s taste and finally decided on one that was right across the street from a gorgeous cathedral called St. John’s Co-Cathedral. It’s called a co-cathedral because ordinarily Rome will only allow a city to have one cathedral, but Valletta petitioned the Pope to allow them to have two, so now they have two co-cathedrals, St. John’s and St. Paul’s. We sat outside at umbrella tables and had a mediocre meal but a very good time. Afterwards we walked down to the dock area which is a string of warehouses that have been refurbished and is now a wide boulevard of shops, cafes and restaurants. We met a few other friends and ended the night with a gelato.
The next morning we didn’t have any specific plans. Everyone was going in a different direction so Ed and I were on our own. We decided to get a map of Valletta and walk the perimeter of the city. The weather was clear, mid-70’s. We got our map at the visitor’s center and set out. All the way around the city there is either a bastion or a fort or a defensive wall of some kind. It was a shorter walk than we had anticipated, less than 2 ½ miles. We stopped at a small outdoor café for a cup of coffee and right outside the fence of the café was a walled terrace with 8 cannons pointing out to sea. A ceremony was about to take place which featured shooting a cannon at noon. It happened to be 11:50AM so we were just in time to see and HEAR the cannon being discharged. What a thrill!
When we’d completed the circle we decided to go to the National Library and on our way there we ran into another couple we knew from the ship. They told us they had been to Mdina and it was well worth the trip, a 20-minute bus ride away. They even gave us their daily bus pass to use. So we decided to go after visiting the library.
The Library was interesting but not what I expected. It was a research library where only the most scholarly Maltese hang out. We were given visitor passes and went up to the “reading room”. There were only 3 or 4 people there and the only things we were interested in seeing were the war exhibits and historical information. There were some old books that were so disintegrated that they were being held together by string. We stayed about 10 minutes.
I’m going to write a separate blog on Mdina because it was so fascinating and we can only download 5 pictures.
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