MALTA

Friday, July 19

Our friends Matt and Corrie Ott and Tom and Liz Dowd decided to go to the island of Malta this past weekend. They invited Sarah Zimmerman and I along, since our husbands are training in Poland for a couple weeks. Sarah and I didn't hesitate! We were the best 5th and 6th wheel we could be! We became the "Zimmer-Wulf's" for the weekend. :)We hopped on a cheap Ryanair flight and we were off!

Saturday, July 20

It was a last minute trip, so I didn't have much time to do research on the island. When we arrived I discovered that this tiny island is actually a country! At one point they were part of the British Empire. They still drive on the "wrong" side of the street! It made our trip even more of an adventure!

We rented two cars, which quickly became the boy's car and girl's car. Lizzie was the only girl brave enough to drive the whole 5 days we were there! I was the "brave" navigator. :)

Corrie and Sarah were our backseat drivers...er, cheerleaders. :)

We stayed in a little town called Zebbug. It looks like it would be pronounced just as it's written, but it's pronounced "Zebbooj." It's fun to say! Any time we saw a VW we would say "slooj booj" instead of "slug bug."

Our first full day we drove the car to the opposite side of Malta to catch a ferry to the island of Gozo.

I think the country of Malta was celebrating our arrival because there were banners in each town. :) They also set off fireworks every night, and even during the day!!

Our first destination on Gozo was the Azure Window, Blue Hole and Inland Sea. This cave, located in the Inland Sea, was around the corner from the Blue Hole and less crowded. We all swam into the cave and out the other side. I've never seen or swam in water so blue!

They don't have many sandy beaches on any of the islands. There were a LOT of rocks, and with rocks comes a LOT of crabs. 

When I got up from this rock I was perched on, about a dozen crabs went scurrying. Then out popped a shrimp! He was very curious, and kept reaching for me.  After doing a little research I discovered he just wanted to clean my fingers. It was slightly intimidating at the time seeing his little claws. He grabbed onto my finger for a second and it felt like he was tickling it. I never thought I would go to Malta to have a shrimp clean my finger! 

After a couple hours, we headed over to the Azure Window above the Blue hole. It's about 50 feet above the water. It's also quickly deteriorating, so the next time I see this it may not even be an arch anymore!  People actually jump off of that!

This is Matt and Corrie Ott. They're expecting a baby boy soon. :)

Tom Dowd, Sarah Zimmerman, and Matt Ott jumping into the blue hole. (Not from the top of the Azure Window.)

After a long and fun day in the water we were starving, so we headed to dinner in Victoria, the main city on Gozo. We hopped on the ferry one last time back to Malta.

Sunday, July 21st

The next morning we all went to one of the most famous sites on Malta: The Blue Grotto. We unsuccessfully tried to view it from above. The only way to see it is from a boat. We all hopped on and threw on some lovely life vests.

Sarah being silly.

This is it!!

We actually went inside the cave in the boat! 

The boat ride was only about 20 minutes, but it was definitely worth the 8 Euro we paid!

Matt, Sarah and Tom

After our quick boat ride the boys went scubba diving, so the girls headed to Paceville on the north side of the island.

We were hunting for a Thai massage, but we found food instead. We sat sweating while we ate our lunch, and then realized that there was an air conditioned restaurant 15 feet from where we'd been sitting. DOH!

The air conditioned restaurant also had one of our favorite displays. It was a polar bear and a painting of a water fall!! Haha! So corny!

 We found a great Thai massage around the corner from our restaurant. Most of us had to be in the same room together which made it slightly awkward at first, but it was one of THE best massages I've ever had!

After working really hard, we headed to one of the only sandy beaches on the island. :)

Apparently, other people wanted to relax on a soft, sandy beach too. Golden Bay Beach was definitely worth going to if not for the people watching...

I mean...just look at these goof balls! :)

 I'm sure we entertained a few people. :)

We were all pretty hungry by this point, so we headed to the Mdina for dinner.

It surprisingly didn't take long to get used to riding on the "wrong" side of the road.

After we made a parking spot, we had to take some serious sunset pictures. :)

I think Malta can come up with a better bus line name than "KopTaco."

As we strolled then skipped to the Mdina (yes, skipped) we found this cool tree.

We made it inside! 

It's not hard to see why several movies were filmed here including: Gladiator and The Count of Monte Cristo. (Two of my favs!)

Thanks to a great recommendation from a friend, we ate at the Fontanella Tea Room. They're known for their cakes. We humored our waiter by ordering some food, which was delicious, and then ordered about 10 slices of cakes including: chocolate and orange; hazelnut, apple and chocolate; and lemon cheesecake just to name a few. They didn't disappoint. Our waiter told us he had never seen an order like ours in all the years he had worked there! Haha!

We walked around the side of the restaurant, and sat on top of the large wall that encircles the Mdina. We got a great view of Malta at night!

Malta has such a unique combination of cultures. You have British, Arabic, and Italian influences just to name a few. It was fun to see several British phone booths in the Mdina in front of the catholic churches. 

I love this picture of the four girls. For some reason it makes me want to sing, "Follow the yellow brick road." :)

On the way out of the Mdina Sarah and I danced our way through the streets. It's definitely a night I won't forget!

Monday, July 22nd

The highlight of the trip for me was spending an entire day sailing on a catamaran! We initially showed up to the wrong location and were about 15 minutes late, but it didn't matter because we were the only people on the boat other than the crew and a couple. They served us drinks, snacks, and a delicious lunch. Best. day. EVER!

Yes, they had beanbags on the catamaran!

AND they had hammocks! Clearly, we weren't having a good time. :)

Malta is the island that Paul the Apostle shipwrecked. There's a statue of Paul in the background of the photo.

We sailed from the north side of Malta to the island of Comino. This is where parts of The Count of Monte Cristo were also filmed. St Mary's Tower, pictured above, is where the Count was imprisoned. We stayed here for lunch and got to swim in the Blue Lagoon and into caves just below St. Mary's Tower.

This boat was anchored next to us in the Blue Lagoon. They had hundreds of people aboard! This is what just about every other ship looked like compared to ours. 

Luckily the catamaran was stocked with lots of noodles. I don't think I could have done all of that swimming without a noodle to help keep me afloat.

Matt...on a boat..on a purple beanbag...RULE.

"Ahoy, yonder!"

Family photo :)

The crew had one of the best mixes of music I've ever heard. We all got up and danced and danced and danced!

Toward the end of the day we sailed along the Grand Harbor on the east side of Valletta, which is the capitol of Malta.

This was supposed to be a really silly photo, but it turned out to be pretty cute. :)

This is one of my favorite photos that I accidentally took as I was handing someone my camera.

By 6pm we were docked again on Malta. I would do this trip again in a heartbeat! 

Tuesday, July 23rd

Tuesday was the last full day we had in Malta. Tom and Liz were heading back mid-day, so we tried to squeeze a few things in. We first drove to Popeye's Village where the 1980 movie "Popeye" starring Robin Williams was filmed. It's now an open air museum.

The next town we drove to was Naxxar to see the Palazzo Parisio.

They had some of the most beautiful bougainvilleas I've ever seen.

We had to stop and feed the turtles before we left.

On our way back to the car we saw this amazing sign. We couldn't pass up the opportunity to mimic it.

Our last stop was Valletta. We hiked up to the Saluting Battery where they fire off the noon- day gun at the Upper Barraca Gardens overlooking the Grand Harbor. 

We headed further into the city. I loved the color and architecture of the buildings.

We had lunch at Cafe Cordina in the center of Valletta before we bid farewell to Tom and Liz. 

St. John's Cathedral 

We strolled the streets for about an hour longer before we were too hot. 

Corrie, Sarah and I walked down to the waterfront in Valletta and Matt picked us up and drove us to a nearby beach to cool off.

This was the flattest surface we could find on the beach. We each set up a towel in the squares and jumped in the refreshing water.

We had an early morning flight the next morning, so we headed back early to get packed and ready to go.

Malta was much different than I had imagined it would be. I had pictured a colorful, lush green island, with sandy beaches, and instead it was almost arid, sand-colored, with rocky beaches. It's combination of cultures makes it one of the most unique places I've ever visited. I would highly recommend a weekend trip to Malta!