Valletta

We went to Malta!! The wife booked this as flights werecheap, it was another country to tick off, even though it’s teeny weeny, andbecause it looked ace! We saw it on one of Cruising with Jane McDonaldprogrammes. I know, we watch some great tele. I didn’t really know too muchabout Malta, but the history is bonkers! Some of it predates Stonehenge and thePyramids in Egypt by over a thousand years! That’s well old. It’s also been‘owned’ by loads of folk. Just when trying to learn a bit of the lingo, you cansee the influences from history. Example:

Welcome is Merhaba, which is an Arabic greeting.

Thank you is grazzi, which is a bit Italian.

Good Morning is Bongu, with a funny accent on the g makingit a j sound, which is basically bonjour, French.

We then took it over in 1800, and gave it back in the 1950s,so there is a massive British feel about it, with their red phone boxes andpost boxes, driving cars on the left, and selling Waitrose stuff in cornershops! My friend said ‘It’s like living in 1980s Britain. A bit like Gibraltar,but not as shit’.

We flew to the airport, got an Uber equivalent to the place we were staying. I downloaded Taxify, just for ease. Public transport is alright like, but for a 16 minute car journey, it was over an hour by bus. Found the AirBnB, of course, and went for a wander to Valletta, the capital. We got a bus. £1.50 for any journey. This was a good deal at times, but others, when there were a couple of changes, not so much.

When we got to Valletta, there were loads of folk cutting about in fancy dress. Decent stuff too, not tin foil and a bin bag or anything. Turns out there was a massive carnival thing on today. We went round the city, saw some sights. It was fine to walk around the whole place, as it’s small enough. A lot of it is pedestrianised and that. Old buildings, fountains, big walls around it all.

Saw statue of Queen Victoria, orange trees, pigeons. Walked round to Birkirka Gardens, where they fire a cannon at 1200 an 1600 every day. They do a little speech and that, then try to sell you a teddy bear, or a tour to somewhere else, or for a fiver you can go and have a closer look. Fired one, and that was it. Carried on back and heard the carnival.

It was bonkers!! Loads of floats just sat in the road, each one playing louder music than the one before it. Kids and grown ups dressed in all sorts, dancing and that. Everyone looked proper miserable though! Had a walk around it for a bit, but it turned out too much. It was really disorientating with the Cotton Eye Joe blasting into one ear, and Siberian hip-hop in the other, whilst being pelted with giant confetti and dodging mermaid tails.

We went to find a bus, and went home to our apartment thing. Once again, Google Maps is amazing. Tells you which bus to get, timings all sorts. Thanks Google. This is not a sponsored ad or anything. Do Google even do adverts? I doubt it. Remember Ask Jeeves!? Wonder where he is now.

Gozo

Next day, we decided to go to Gozo. This is a smaller islandjust north of Malta, a sister island. It’s like a Dive Haven for divers andthat. We didn’t go diving. In-between the two, there is a tiny island with notraffic and one hotel called Comino or summat. I’ll Google this when I finish.Bus to Cirkewwa, 30 min Ferry to Mgarr. The bus the other side was properrammed! Like, 60 people on a 40 seater. Went to the main town, Victoria, andhad a McDonalds. More expensive than ours. They did these chips called Scoopand Go or summat. Shells of chips where you could pick up more dip. There was agirl watching 50 Shades of Grey on her iPad, proper loud! Bit inappropriate.Also saw an F&F shop! Like, three floors of Tesco clothes! Much moreexpensive than ours. Char took pics of what she wanted for the kids, andordered them online for when we got home!

We had wanted to go to a beach. I chose one which looked like it might have sand on, but I wasn’t sure. Turns out it didn’t. Char shouted at me. The choice was between the place where the Azure Window was, and another beach called Dwerja Bay down the coast. The Azure Window collapsed a few months before we got there, so that was annoying. Still, the place looked ace. Had a cool inland sea with a small cave inbetwixed it and the actual sea, which you can sail through. Kids just chucked stones into it for about half hour. Walked the coast bit which was well rocky, full of boulders and rock pools and that.

Had an ice cream, went back to the inland sea bit. Then, had to have a mad run up the hill to the bus which we saw coming down the hill, otherwise we would have had to spend another hour there! Not that much to do, especially as we had seen everything we wanted and it wasn’t the warmest of days! Got on a rammed bus, then changed to another rammed bus at Victoria to go back to the ferry terminal. Waited in the rammed waiting room thing to be rammed through a back set of doors as the main one was broken. Got to the rammed café and rammed some coffee down my throat. Rammed.

Got off the ferry and ran to a well busy bus stop and forcedour way onto it! Main thing I’ll take back from Malta is how busy the bussesare! We got off after nearly an hours journey at the place we had to get off,which is appropriate, and ended up having to walk through a tunnel on an almostdual carriage way road! A bit silly, but was our only option. Got back, went tobed.

Next day was our last. We do normally leave our bags with the AirBnB person, but this time because of busses and locations and where we needed to be, made more sense to take with us. Ended up getting a taxi to the Science Centre, Esplora. Another interactive place for kids. We got there and dropped our bags off. As we were chatting to the almost identical looking 5 receptionist type ladies, a song came on their playlist. It went like this – ‘Smack that, all on the floor, smack that give me some more, smack that till you get sore’, bit awkward in front of the kids! The women were well embarrassed and jumped up to change it!

We then walked to a sandy beach. It was rubbish! Smaller than a sandpit from Argos, but full of rubbish! Walked back to the Esplora. Went round for a couple of hours, but wasn’t great. Things were broken and that, loads of school kids taking over the rooms. Kids enjoyed though.

Walked to the main town to get some food. Meelie knockedover Stan’s drink which went everywhere. I had a minging pizza. Not great allround! Taxi to airport, home. When we got to Gatwick, we had booked a hotelnearby. Stan fell over in the car park when we picked our car up from PurpleParking. Cut his knees. Also turns out he dropped his new toy snake. A fact wedidn’t find out till we got to the hotel! I ended up doing a 25 min round tripto go and get it! Next day, we went to London. It might come next in the blogyou know! It might not.