Sunday 12 July to Tuesday 14 July, 2015
We arrived hard into Valletta, late Saturday night.
We stepped out after midnight; everybody quit serving food about 23:30 and only the bars were open, so we had a drink and crashed about 2:00.
So we slept in a little Sunday morning, then set out to breakfast and to pick up some food for our apartment. This was our first real chance to look around and see Malta.
It is almost a sensory overload, after the drab colors of Sicily. I feel stunned almost, not sure where or what to stare at next. I seriously wandered around in a kind of daze for a while. The coffee helped, as did just sitting in front of the massive main church, looking around as we ate. I had a traditional tuna sandwich, Gail has a non-traditional egg on toast.
Let’s see. Basic information:
Valletta is the capital city of Malta, and covers less than one square kilometer. If you look at the map, you’ll see how it sticks out, a peninsula. Imagine building a sturdy fortress wall where the peninsula connects to the mainland, then building more walls with sharp corners on top of the cliffs, looking out at the bay around you. Inside the walls you have a high side, which kind of runs down the middle of the point of land, and slopes away to both sides.
That’s a rough idea.
The city is densely packed with UNESCO monuments and sights, in fact it is known for having more monuments in a smaller area than anywhere in the world.
We are staying at the Palazzo Valletta Suites, in the Malta Penthouse, way up in the highest part of the city. It is a full apartment, a funky-cool sort of three story high place, immaculately decorated, with spiral staircase and immense views from a roof top terrace.
We even have our own private elevator with a secret code, to whisk us up to this penthouse.
We look down on the Upper Barrakka gardens, the grand harbor, on most everything around. Across the water from us are the Three Cities; Vittoriosa, Senglea and Cospicua, which started as Phoenician trading ports.
Malta itself is about 122 square miles, with 420,000 people total. But, you can buy citizenship here for a mere 1.2 million euro. Tourism is the big industry, Maltese the official language which is a kind of mix of Arabic and Italian, but they speak Italian and English as well.
In fact, that is part of the surprise: how "English" it is here.
They drive on the “wrong side” of the road, use the “Yellow Globe on the Striped Pole” crosswalk signs, and have little red phone booths everywhere. The Palace is called Buckingham and has a miniature version of the changing of the two guards. It is a constitutional Monarchy of England, so they worship the Queen but have their own president and Parliament and so on. Lots and lots of English people are here on vacation, and we are most often assumed to be English.
The guards appear off and on, depending if the president is around and what is happening. Most times the doors to the palace are simply closed. In front there is a big square, with water shooting up in one area. Kids have a great time day and night playing in the water. At night there are the lighted paving stones, like so many other places in Europe.
What really strikes you as odd about Malta is how clean it is. There is just no trash.
OK. we found a plastic bottle outside our door, but the cleanliness is catching: we picked it up and threw it away. No trash anywhere.
And then, there is no graffiti to speak of. We pass block after block of blank walls. Even the abandoned gas station has no spray paint or vandalism.
We did see one or two spots way out in the country on a hike, and there was some trash blown in the water of the Marsaxlokk harbor, but overall it is very clean.
Beggars?
We have seen one person, in four days so far, and I think she was a total fake because she looked more like a desperate drug user than a Roma.
We had our laundry done one day by a friend of the owner who wanted some extra cash. There is no self service laundry here, maybe one coin-op is up in St. Julians’ across the harbor, and I did not want to pay per piece. But this worked out for everyone.
About 90 degrees, which is not bad, but the humidity is really high, and we are sweating just sitting still.
Hot enough to seek the shade when we walk, and to drive you indoors during the middle of the afternoon.
After we ate we ran over to the closest grocery store to stock up on water (the tap water is not good for drinking) more water and more water, which we took home and promptly froze and chilled.
Some snacks, wine, juice and so on. The grocery store is two stories high plus a basement, and the food is actually arranged nicely on wooden shelves built into the walls. It is very old fashioned looking. A little of this and a little of that, and if you need something they run up to storage and look for it.
We dropped the food off back at the apartment, and set out to make some sense of this place.
The streets are all stone, and lined by buildings that are about four or five stories high. It makes sort of a “cool canyon” effect for walking. There are more balconies here, and many of them are covered, made into little wooden stick-out rooms. In fact, that is one of the real defining things about Valletta, the balconies. You will notice it in the photos.
Later in the afternoon we stopped for a snack at Angelica’s. I had sea urchins on toast, which was new to me. They tasted slightly sharp, peppery, a little of that sea mist flavor you get with barnacles. They paired well with my wine, a vermentino by Meridiana Wine Estate. Gail chose a two cheese plate: pepper cheese in vinegar, and white sheep milk cheese in oil. Both are local Maltese cheeses. I liked the white cheese better, Gail the sharp taste of the pepper cheese. She drank a chardonnay, vermentino, and voignier blend from Meridiana.
We enjoyed it here so much that we returned for dinner the next night.
That second night we had a good red wine, a syrah and merlot blend. I had the local rabbit in champagne, which Jamie Oliver says is “…the best rabbit in Malta.” It was really good, simply done, and lightly herbed so you could actually taste the rabbit. Gail had a bite, but she does not like to eat cute animals. So, she had vegetarian lasagna, which she loved. We went out for gelato for dessert.
It is religious feast time. I will write more about this in a later post.
The bells ring a lot here, which is a satisfying sound. The method they use to mark time is off the norm a little, so I have trouble figuring out what time it is; that being said, they are pretty regular with their schedule.
So the first day we spent exploring the city, walking the streets and along the walls of the city. We were surprised by the humidity and the general lack of a breeze. Anytime we hit the shade it seemed like the temperature dropped a good twenty degrees, so we tried to keep in the shadow of the buildings. Eventually we stopped for drinks by down by the water front. There is a cruise ship dock here, as well as working docks for offloading ocean ships, and the usual harbors for yachts.
There is a cool light - art installation down by the Parliament building. Lights shine down on the square, and as you walk through them somehow the pattern interacts with, changes and swirls around you. The artist is Miguel Chevalier, and he is famous for these "Magic Carpet" installations.
There are restaurants and cafes everywhere, in the squares, down the main streets and on the side streets.
That first night we stopped to eat indoors at Palazzo Preca, where they started us with some Aubergine Bruschetta. I had Mushrooms vol-ah-vent, which was blue cheese and mushrooms in a flake-pastry case. Then I had Chicken with Truffle Parmesan cream and I was disappointed because the truffles were barely there. Gail had an excellent Salmon with Leeks which she really enjoyed.
Our third night, after the Rabat trip, we went to dinner at D'Office. The wine was a local cab franc "from small pocket vineyards" in Malta, and it was really light but good. We shared a small plate of mussels, then Gail got a local salad with grilled Malta Sausage draped over it, and I had a huge bowl of pasta with mushrooms, the local Malta sausage, and cream sauce. It was a great dinner at a fantastic price.
We have been trying to explore in the mornings, hide out in the heat of the day, and then explore at night. Sometimes it does not work out at all.
Overall Valletta seems to be a good base to stay and explore the surrounding areas.