Qawra Palace St. Paul's Bay

... in French and kept pointing to my backpack so I just gave him our own homegrown version of the finger wag that we use from time to time and walked off. What is it with them? These French people just need to handle their own business and leave me alone.

Across a narrow inlet is a town called Vittoriosa and it looked interesting enough for me to figure out how to get there. Somehow I managed to find another Maltese version of a chicken ...

... the first bite past my tongue. It came with a salad with a dried out piece of salmon, five tiny, tiny pieces of hard potato salad and wilted lettuce. Dessert was fruitcake. Yep, Christmas time fruitcake like grandma gives you. Now I understand that some people want food but wouldn't it just be better to not serve anything than to embarrass yourself with **** like that? Luckily Ryanair has me conditioned to eat beforehand so I didn't miss much by ...

... Kirchen, Kapellen und Heiligen-Statuen überall. Laut Statistik sind 98% der Malteser römisch-katholisch. Dieser Umstand ist wohl auch verantwortlich, dass Ehescheidung ist nicht möglich und "oben ohne" baden überall verboten. Komischerweise sind fast alle Kirchen und Ähnliches außen mit Glühbirnen bestückt, so dass man sie abends von weitem sieht. Tagsüber hat es aber doch oft eher etwas von Karussell. Und was ich persönlich total schade finde, ist, dass die meisten Kirchen ...

... with my mum and dad for years, I think we were all slightly concerned about how it would go. But it was just great. We staying in a huge 3 bedroom apartment right on the water, where we could watch the people and boats coming and going from the sunny balcony. Dad was eager to show me all the sights, where he grew up and the church he used to go to.One day we went on a boat tour to the Blue Lagoon and I went swimming in the most beautiful clear blue water I have ...

... were left on our own. We ate at a little cafe near campus then headed back to the hotel. The University is so confusing. We have two trial weeks of class, and many of the professors and international students don't even show up to class the first week. Then registration begins and after that there is an add/drop period. The campus is even confusing. There are a lot of dead ends and mysterious sidewalks and alleyways that don't actually go anywhere. There are ...

... islands. The top highlights of the trip: 1. MDINA: The small medival walled city of Mdina was easily one of our favorite little places in all of Europe to date. The traffic free, narrow alleys wound through the hill-top town and around into surprising courtyards and to walls overlooking the island all the way to the coast. We watched a bit of a local wedding, dined at a small wine bar on fondu and drank lots of Maltese wine. 2. VALLETTA: The capital city of ...

... club and we just talked shop for a time. Every single guy that walked past, regardless of their age would say hello and shake Edwin's hand. He was the king. He introduced me to many of them ("Dan tifil ta Joe Galea...") and I felt real cool sitting there smashing the pastizzi into me and talking my best Maltese. Any time a bar staff would walk past Edwin would call out to bring us some more food or drink and he would say "Tell them it is for Edwin". :) Well the best was yet to come ...

Today, being a Saturday, was designated as time to spend with my Maltese family and once again they had a fantastic itinerary planned for me when they picked me up at 9am. I soon learned there were some special places in store for me today including the one place I longed to see the most since planning my trip to Malta, the famous Blue Grotto. But I will get to that in turn. First stop was Mosta and the most important and famous church in Malta. The Church of Santa Maria ...

... day, one of my best on the whole trip. I hand only been in Malta two days, and I was loving it. I was loving the sights, and couldn't get enough of finding a new vantage point. I was thinking by the end of Thursday, that Valletta and the surround have got to be my favourite city that I have visited. The fortifications, the buildings, the harbours, the crazy bus terminus, and the people are all a delight to see. And best of all, the Pastizzi is scrumptious!!!!!!!

... here - nothing is cheap (except for the bus and pastizzi!), and while at times the prices are hard to digest, we've become better at budgeting when we need to and have learnt to just accept that the cost of travelling here is quite high. We are just grateful that we don't need to try to make our money last any longer than we originally budgeted for! Italy will be more expensive, so this is good preparation for us. Here is an example of the cost of things. We were carrying around lots of ...