Molto Malta

After much debate, it was finally decided that MALTA would be the winner for my two week Christmas break destination.  But for the first time in years, I would not be travelling alone.  Dear Thomas decided to brave a trip with me.

First, I flew to Munich, Germany to meet up with him.  We went to his company's Christmas party the night that I flew in it was a cold, snowy evening, and I realized very quickly that I really don't miss the snow and cold.  We took a walk over to the small Christmas market in the center of his town.  Very wet and rainy, yuck.

Christmas market in Traunstein.

Christmas market in the square near St. Oswald's.

A day later, we headed of to Malta and the promise of warmer Mediterranean weather.

We got off the plane to beautiful, sunny weather.  The temperature was about 16º C or 60ºF.  Not bad, but not as toasty as the UAE.

View from our first hotel.

Bus tour of Malta

For our first full day, we decided to do one of those "Hop On Hop Off" tours.  What's great about them is that they take you around to all of the major tourist spots...you can get off the bus and hang out as long as you want, and then "hop on" the next bus that comes by.  We started our tour around 11:30 am and didn't realize how looong it was.  I was about 4 1/2 hours just to do the trip without making any stops!  We realized we were going to have to be really selective where we decided to get off the bus.

Building facades in Malta

Christmas decorations in a small town.

Our first stop was the small Marsaxlokk (pronounced Mar-sha-lok) fishing village with a population of about 3,000.  Every Sunday the place comes alive with a bustling fish market that includes the sale of tourist trinkets.  The harbor is full of colorful "luzzu" boats; many of which have the mythical "Eye of Osiris" painted on their prow to protect the fisherman and his family from evil.  This tradition is believed to have been brought to the island as far back as 800BC when the Phoenicians had settled the area.

Colorful boats in Marsaxlokk.

Our next stop was the Blue Grotto which is actually a number of sea caverns.  We took a small boat through the small caves.  The water was a beautiful cobalt blue color, and we could see the small uninhabited island of Filfla, which is a designated nature preserve for migrating birds.  It is said that in 1987 the biggest shark ever captured was found in these waters, a 7.2 meter great-white!  Yikes!

Thomas and I at the Blue Grotto.

View from the Blue Grotto to Flifla Island.

The caverns of the Blue Grotto.

The crystal waters of the Blue Grotto.

We saved some time for a stop at the ancient Ħaġar Qim temples and the falconry center, but the temples were closing and the falconry center had already closed for the day.  We decided to come by another day.

There was a lady that had a little stray cat village set up with a small box you could put donations in.  We stopped and chatted with her for a few minutes.  So sweet!

I have no idea what this guy was filming, but he was calling up to our bus yelling, "Wave! Wave!"

Santa and the Mrs. working overtime.

Merry Christmas in four different languages.  Il-Milied It-Tajjeb!