Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - Trip Report First Visit to Malta

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Very interesting, we had considered adding Malta to a Sicily itinerary a few years ago but ran out of time. I hope we can get there one day.

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Originally Posted by tcinct (Post 17684833)

Thank you for reading tripplanner. Christmas decorations must have been quite a sight to see!

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Originally Posted by ANUJ (Post 17684990)

Very interesting, we had considered adding Malta to a Sicily itinerary a few years ago but ran out of time. I hope we can get there one day.

Thank you, Anuj. I enjoyed your trip report about Molise and Abruzzo. We have been to Molise a few times and enjoyed our stays there. We are west of Naples now checking out the Phlegrian Fields and it's another great location to explore!

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Originally Posted by tripplanner001 (Post 17685049)

Tripplanner, thank you for sharing the holiday photos! We saw some fireworks one evening from our apartment. We kept watching and saying that must be the grand finale but the fireworks continued for much longer than we expected and with 35 fireworks factories in Malta it's quite the show! There's even an International Festival of Fireworks every year in late April or early May.

The Three Cities

On a windy afternoon we visited The Three Cities. They are made up of three neighboring towns across the Grand Harbor from Valletta. They are Senglea (aka Isla), Cospicua (aka Bormla) and Vittoriosa (aka Birgu) It was a windy day so we didn’t try the harbor crossing. A Bolt taxi dropped us off on the south end of Senglea at Gardjola Gardens where a small guard tower is located with impressive views of the harbor and Valletta. There were no crowds to be found and with no set plan we just wandered the streets.
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The entrance to Gardjola Gardens
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Walking along the streets and seeing some welcoming doorways in Senglea
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From the translation on the monument-In memory and in respect of those who lost their lives during the Second W
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What beautiful buildings and grounds near the American University of Malta.
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Need power for your electric car? No worries, just plug in with a LONG extension cord. We did a double take on this one and cracked up laughing-the extension cord went from the car up to the second floor!
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The bridge from Senglea to Cospicua
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Vittoriosa
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Vittoriosa and some colorful Maltese balconies

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Originally Posted by travelon98 (Post 17684945)

Thanks tcinct

Hi Travelon,
Looking back at my notes the website Malta.com listed 7 walks that might be of interest.

On day 5 of our stay we took a sea side walk along a beautiful wide promenade with historic sites including a tower and a fort turned into a restaurant. There are benches to sit and enjoy the view. There are rocky beaches, a few small sandy patches of beach, hotels, bars, restaurants, cafes, and coffee shops. We walked to Spinola Bay in San Julian to try Maltese cuisine at Gululu. We were offered a table and drinks till the restaurant opened. Our choices included Krustini Kappunata which is grilled Maltese bread spread with little aubergine chunks cooked with onion, capers, olives, and tomatoes. Froga Tat-Tarja Biz-Zalzett Malti is a crisp flat pasta cake resembling an omelette made of strands of fine spaghetti mixed with egg, Maltese sausage, a generous dose of grana Padano cheese, finely chopped parsley and roughly ground pepper. A fresh salad and Spnotta Mixwijia-grilled fillets of fresh sea bass, with an olive and raisin tapenade finished the meal. Service was good, the food was fresh and tasty!
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The fort turned into a restaurant
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Rocky beaches
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The promenade
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A stretch of sandy beach
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Krustini Kappunata
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Froga Tat-Tarja Biz-Zalzett Malti
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Spinola Bay

While driving to the Gozo ferry passing through Paceville I noticed the stunning twisting design of a building in the distance. I later learned the building was the Mercury Tower that was designed by Architect Zaha Hadid who tragically died before it was finished. We decided to walk along the lovely promenade from Sliema to St Julian to check out the Tower, the Odyssey Adventure, and had booked lunch reservations there at Toro Toro, too..

The 30+ story tower is amazing! It includes a hotel, restaurants, apartments, a three-level shopping mall and a square. For the Odyssey Adventure we booked tickets online because tickets were a better deal than buying them at the location.

After checking in at the Odyssey Adventure there’s a walk through 5 rooms with well done video and audio isplays to learn about the history and culture of Malta. The flying theater is the last part of the adventure and takes visitors through scenic highlights of Malta in a Disneyesque like ride. It was worth the price of admission!
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The Mercury Tower with the Mercury House in the forefront.

What an incredible thread with such glorious photos!

I know NOTHING about Malta, or at least I knew nothing before reading this!! I was never interested because, although I knew there was a Maltese language, I had imagined a heavily British-influenced island (sort of a big Gibraltar). I now see how wrong I was. I also had no idea of how many towns and cities were on the island......

So you felt as if you were in an entirely different country, being there?? With many people speaking Maltese? (I don't mind being in a place where little English is spoken but it does appear that English is well understood and widely spoken on the island..)

There seems to be a specific Maltese cuisine, a sort of mash of North African and Italian--would that be about right?

I love Sicily....but this is totally different I think....

Is it best to have one base, as you did, and were you hoppy that you chose that town for a base to explore the island, plus Gozo?

This is all new to me, so sorry if the questions bely my ignorance!!!

I continue to consider Malta, as fascinating as it sounds, what is starting to concern me are cruise boats. As someone noted they can unload up to 10,000 people and that will absolutely change everything in the experience. I would expect that January-February, the period we are considering, there are a lot of cruise boats.

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Originally Posted by travelon98 (Post 17685704)

Hi Travelon,
The cruise ships do bring tourists, and over tourism can be very frustrating. Checking the cruise ship schedules in advance helps you to choose the best days to avoid the crowds. It seems like Valletta and Mdina are very popular for tours. By visiting these busy areas in the morning or after the cruise ships leave you will be able to have an enjoyable time!

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Originally Posted by ekscrunchy (Post 17685683)

Hi EKS!
Thank you for your kind comments! I am enjoying your trip report on The Mezzogiorno!!! with your wonderful food diaries, your experiences, and capers with your car rental and parking! We read about Spaghetti All'assassina in your trip report and went to Al Sorso Preferito for lunch because it was an easy train ride from Trani. We did notice there was a bit of heat. We each found a small red hot pepper on our plates which may account for that. We ordered the meatballs as an app and they were good. They were served with tasty tomatoes that supplied about a year's worth of salt. The perfect way we ended the meal was with the most delicate flaky sporcamusi, a custard filled pastry which translates to dirty faces!

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I hope this answers your questions-We enjoyed Sicily, too, but Malta is different and you do feel like you are in a different country. The language barrier is minimal and we barely needed translation apps. Restaurants are plentiful and offer all kinds of cuisines beyond African and Italian influences.
For example, one of the restaurants we tried at the Mercury Tower was Toro Toro serving food and drinks with Pan American flavors. We requested a seat by the windows and the views were incredible.
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We had this gorgeously designed restaurant to ourselves for most of our meal because the restaurant had just started having lunch service .
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Toro Toro
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The guacamole delivered to the table was still smoking in a glass cloche dome.
The burrata salad was as good as any we had in Italy. The Quinoa Nikkei Salad was also quite good.
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The salads
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Encocados with black cod, prawns, and squid at the top of the photo, and Kampachi Tiradito with curry
We ordered the La Bomba dessert which is an exploding chocolate sphere dropped onto a large bowl at the table and served with ice cream, chocolate mousse, candy and almond cookie crumbles. I am sure this would be a delight for a child's birthday party!
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La Bomba dessert

I liked having Sliema as a base because it was less crowded than the capital city of Valletta during the daytime. The ferry service at Sliema made it easy to get back and forth to Valletta. We were impressed with the taxi service. It was so reasonable and makes for easy access to the whole island. Gozo intrigued me because it is more laid back and there's the natural beauty of this less touristed island in Malta. There were some amazing home rentals there as well. For a first visit Sliema was a good base for us to see Malta and Gozo. We are still talking about our holiday week there!